


Preventing the Death of an Idiot

by FlusteredWordsmith



Category: School Days (Visual Novel & Related Media)
Genre: Drama, F/M, POV First Person, Romance
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-01-26
Updated: 2016-03-18
Packaged: 2018-01-10 01:47:02
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 11
Words: 48,943
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1153312
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FlusteredWordsmith/pseuds/FlusteredWordsmith
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>What course of action would you take, given the chance to alter the flow of your favorite story? Young Rupert Hudson finds himself granted the ability to prevent the bloody fate of both Makoto Itou and his victims. While the scandalous story stood far from anything Rupert would label as "favorite", he is drawn to act, despite the inevitable pain.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Intermittent Hypnic Myoclonia

**Author's Note:**

> Yep, this story is my first attempt at a publicly available fanfic. At the time of writing, the only knowledge of the School Days franchise I held included the plot of the anime, the plot of the manga, a few routes of the game, and a general outline of the second sequel Cross Days via its respectable manga.

I am just like you.  
Probably.  
I hope.

My name will likely fail to impress, but you can remember me as Rupert Hudson, and I managed to stumble upon another world. This world should not exist, not in our plane of reality. However, I have peered into it from afar, ignorant of its truth. Perhaps you have as well.

In most people's eyes, I carry the label of "nerd", and I am not at all adverse to the idea. It has occurred to me that maybe I do play a few too many video games, talk to too few people, and watch more than my fair share of Japanese animations. I would never go so far as to refer to myself as an "otaku", though my knowledge of the term may prove otherwise to those less privy. The only outward giveaway of my nature takes the shape of the small pair of rectangular spectacles sitting lightly on the tip of my curved nose, and even this should not stand as enough to judge a person. Physically, I appear only a few inches over five feet and in terms of weight I haul around only about a hundred and a score of pounds.

I will refrain from disclosing more boring details concerning my life than necessary, and state that I had simply spent another school night in front of my computer, studying the plot of another show rather than calculus. Every year I would begin to feel a sudden urge that takes over only in fall and lasts for just a month or two. Well, I use to anyway, during my less than eventful years in high school.

My brain felt the urge this month though, nearly two years since it last hazed over my mind. Instead of partaking in a new batch of anime, however, I reviewed an old favorite. My jaded younger self became fascinated with the bloody ending of a show entitled School Days. Years had gone by since I last thought of this show.

Long story short, the drama follows a young man in high school with two girls pining for him. He started innocent enough, with little knowledge in romance, trying to woo the heart of one girl with the assistance of another. He succeeds, but the girl who's aid he benefited from began to succumb to her own feelings for him. Eventually, his tale turns down jackass street and he becomes a sex fiend, hurting both girls, driving them to violent insanity. In the end, the girl he had once been closest friends with drove a knife through his stomach more than a few times, and she in turn died at the end of a saw held by the second girl. An unforeseen twist of the highest degree, and many believe he deserved every gut-rending stab. Plus some.

The story also took form in the shape of an interactive novel, a popular sort of game in Japan. As you observe the plot unfold, you make decisions for the main character, steering him either to a bright future with a loving companion, or a painful end that will leave him with more than butterflies in his throat. Or neither. I played a few routes in this game, trying my best to keep him from acting like a completely unfeeling nymphomaniac. I will just say that it took more effort with this thick head than it should with any sensible human being on this planet. The game, interestingly enough, spawned a couple sequels, but I digress.

I should keep in mind that I lack even the most basic romantic experience, so maybe I had a difficult time fully relating to this guy's situation. Having all these pretty girls grab at you sounded like the dream of every guy my age, but do many really know just how nightmarishly such a situation could end? I know I would hate to break a girl's heart, it pained me just to break their virtual ones in the game. Though, I may just be a wuss.

Anyway, back to that horrific world I entered unwillingly. I dozed off in my chair that night, having read a few summaries concerning a few more alternate endings to the game. If I had known that night had been my last in my room, I would have slept in the comfort of my untidy bed. I loved that bed more than anything in my life.

An unfamiliar screech shredded my ears and I fell from a cushiony perch down onto a hardwood floor. My eyes locked onto a cube shaped alarm clock sitting on a nightstand and I immediately slammed my fist down on its snooze button. As I knuckled sleep from my eyes, a growing sense of peculiarity chilled my spine. I fell asleep in my chair, not my bed.

My gaze shifted lazily around the rest of my room. Something about the outlines of every object seemed off. Hold on, do things normally have outlines? Absolutely not. The colors of my room appeared plain yet brighter than ever. The sun peeking through the curtains lit the room with a synthetic looking light, providing strange contrasts between darks and lights, as though the colors had limited ranges of tints and hues.

"Rupert! You're going to be late for school if you don't get up!" shouted a voice that pierced the paper thin walls.

I twitched dramatically, sending my head into the wooden bed frame I lay next to. Never in my life have I come to school tardy, minus any absences due to illness. My legs scrambled to my closet and just before my hand palmed the smooth surface of my closet door, a thought struck me into paralysis. The voice of my mother hurrying me to class had not ruptured my ear drums since high school, and the disclosure of my college schedule has never left my lips, so she could not possibly know when I needed to wake up. Often times, my feet had skirted out the front door long before she even rose from bed. Also, the woman outside my room sounded nothing like the high-pitched shrill my mom emitted.

Something felt strange, or warm and smothering rather. I peered down, the length of my body garbed in the matching shirt and pants of a set of pajamas. Never in my life have I owned pajamas, let alone slept in any. Unsteadily, I shuffled to the door of my room, floated my hand onto the cold brass of its knob, and cautiously pried it inward. The action worked in slow motion, and my mind raced for the possibilities of what the hell was going on.

I gawked at the lack of stairs outside my room. As I tip-toed through the hall, I failed to repel from my mind the fact that I lived in a two story house. Am I dreaming? That would explain the surreal yet believable style the world had taken on. Everything in dreams made sense until the morning tore them away from you. To my right I could make out the innards of a quaint little kitchen, unfamiliar to my memory. A head of dark, velvety strands leaned at the edge of a stove, slender arms visibly occupied with whatever sizzled in that pan.

"Excuse me," I called, knocking on the kitchen archway. "Who are you?"

The woman paused from her cooking for a brief moment to send me a funny look. Her eyes gleamed enormously, deep and brown bowls of infinity set in the fair skin of her face. Human anatomy could not possibly account for this intruder's enlarged features.

She rolled her eyes and returned to her previous work, humming a tune I could not recognize.

"Very funny, Rupert," she sighed. "But did you really have to come down here in your pjs just to be amusing? Go get your uniform on, you’re gonna be late for your first day. Won't make a good first impression of your home country, will it?"

I could only scrunch my eyes in complete confusion as I turned to take in the rest of the house. The walls brimmed with portraits depicting scenes I found hauntingly familiar, but I knew not how. Most contained that same woman in the kitchen, often accompanied by a slightly shorter boy with glasses, also with eyes as big as his face.

But that hair, those glasses... Even behind the unreal veil of this world's strange style, I knew right away that the boy in these photos could be no person other than myself.

This is a weird dream, it was the only conclusion that made sense, and I wandered it with my awareness fully intact. This could soon blossom into the greatest imagined experience of my sad life. I quickly slammed my eyes shut and thought of that cute girl I never had the courage to approach in school. I opened my arms, ready for the most tender and loving embrace I would ever have the pleasure of not really experiencing.

I took a few steps forward, opened my eyes to the blankness before me, and busted my honker in a less than satisfactory hug with the vanilla painted drywall. Wow, alright, dreams do not hurt nearly this bad. Oh, okay yeah that almost feels broken. Tears streamed over my reddened cheeks as I tried not to cry over my failed fantasy. I tenderly dabbed at my bruised nose as I returned to "my" room. Hopefully I had a mirror.

The shiny brown orbs in the closet mirror stared back at me in silent disbelief. Before me stood some kind of sick caricature of my normal self, drawn without my permission. I found my glasses sitting next to the rude alarm clock. I think my hair gleamed a little lighter in color, but I honestly could not truly tell. Ignoring the mess on my head, I nudged the closet open and set my sights on the neatly hung coat and slacks that stuck out from a jumble of random clothing.

At least this uniform looked snazzy, not those cheap private school uniforms that consisted of only a collared shirt and dark pants. It even came with a red tie, talk about formal. I feel like one would find these clothes on a schoolboy from an anime. Wait...

That woman in the kitchen spoke like I had just moved here. Something about representing my home country?

I threw my eyes around the room, I needed to find something that hinted at my location. Next to a computer sat a smug looking shelf, generously endowed with more books than I could ever care to own. I did most of my reading electronically, not that I have anything against physical texts.

I plucked a hardcover from the top shelf, no title on its faded blue cover or spine. I cleaved the print open with little regard to the poor thing's health, and stared slack jawed at the scribble I viewed on the pages. Characters clearly of an Asian alphabet, but I could not pinpoint exactly which dialect. I may have once cared deeply for anime, but I delved little into the language's written form.

I skimmed through a few other books before throwing them all down in defeat. I could hardly wait for the language barrier to rise and strike me in the face when I met any students at whatever crackpot school I must apparently attend. How do I even get there?

The sluggish task of slipping on my new garments took a good ten minutes. Why did I feel so compelled to follow through with this? Curiosity? Stupidity? Am I drugged? My brain felt like it had taken a quick dip in a blender, I needed to calm down with these question before my feeble understanding succumbed to insanity.

A backpack leaned against the wall next to the door, odd bulges indicating, to my distress, more foreign books. I hefted it onto my shoulders, took a deep, unsure breath, and squeezed out of the bedroom door.

The kitchen seemed to have gone mute. Sure enough, when I hazarded a fleeting glance around the entrance, the woman from before had vanished. I noticed a small box, a note taped to its side, sitting on a small table. I ventured a few more glances around the area before snatching the note up in my hands. Gibberish. Blasted bloody boggle-brained scribbles. The note mimicked the language in the books I had perused. A little heart dotted what I deduced to be the end of the message, but I recognized nothing else. I put the paper into my pocket and lifted the lid on the box.

Clouds of steam blanketed out before I had cleared away the lid. Inside, separated by strange little walls, boiled an abundance of freshly cooked meats and vegetables. It all appeared unrecognizable, but delicious all the same. The compartments that separated the portions reminded me of an office complex filled with cubicles.

I replaced the lid and sighed. Obvious enough, this food would satisfy my need for a lunch. Under normal circumstances, the contents of this box would disappear down my throat in a heartbeat, having not partaken in breakfast. My unsettled stomach had other plans. I hope this thing fits into my backpack.

Oh hell, who do I ask for directions? I had planned on consulting the lady responsible for this gourmet bit of boxed lunch, but from the looks of is note, I doubt she...

"Rupert?" floated a voice from an uncomfortable proximity to my rear. "Are you finally ready to head off to school? I hope you haven't missed the train."

A couple awkward missteps later and I finally managed to face my near-killer, who wielded mini heart attacks. Questions surged forth from my every pore, but I needed to pace myself.

"Who are you?" I repeated for the second time that day.

"Would you cut that out?" she huffed, expressing an exaggerated look of comical anger. "Just because you're in high school now, doesn't mean you're too old for me to ground you."

"Yes, of course... mother," I ventured.

"Mother?" she laughed. "Why are you being so formal? You're acting very strange today, more than usual."

"Uh huh," I murmured, less than enthused. My analytical eyes scanned for signs of acting or tells. I failed to spot a single twitch or fidget. She arched an eyebrow at my conspicuous gaze, clearly disturbed.

"Sorry, I guess I'm a tad nervous about my first day of... high school?" I continued. "Won't I have a difficult time learning in a foreign language environment?"

"What do you mean?" she asked with a hint of concern. "Your Japanese sounds fine to me."

Well, I should have expected this inevitable addition of questions while I wallowed in a scenario that made less sense than a donation bowl for rich and famous billionaires. She could not possibly be implying that we were currently speaking Japanese, could she?

"You mean right now?" I asked, my skepticism nearly punching her in the face. "We're speaking Japanese at this moment? Currently?"

"No, silly, we're speaking in Latin," she scoffed, sarcasm bringing a refreshing change to her tone. "Are you going to continue wasting time or are you going to get to the station?"

"One more quick question," I jabbered, settling my eyes on the front door. "Where's the station?"

"We just took it yesterday to visit the Sakakino Academy. You know, your new school?" the woman sighed. "It's just a short walk down the street. Geez, are you really so nervous that you're looking for excuses not to go?"

"Nope, I think I'm suddenly feeling better now," I smiled. "I hope I didn't fool you too hard."

Before another word left either one of our mouths, I had slid by and snaked out the door. I needed to get out of here.

Not a cloud in the sky, yet everything appeared so dreary. A crisp wind pulled slowly along the air and the morning sun sneered at me from behind the tall apartments across the street. Homes and office structures lined every inch of the road. My whole life centered around a small town with few buildings higher than five stories, so this picture jumped straight out of a movie to me. I squinted down the sidewalk and, sure enough, I could just make out what looked like a large platform with a simple roof.

The station did not interest me. No, my quarry stood approximately seven feet high, looked like a vertical coffin, and contained a phone. I think it was about time I call my real home. Or the police.

The route to the train station lacked any sight of a phone booth, so I began backing up to search in the opposite direction. I had just begun to align my head with my rotated body when a blunt force knocked the wind from my lungs and sent me sprawling. A scream, that could have come from a mouse judging by its volume, brushed at my ears and I heard the small tap of my glasses hitting the cement.

I groaned and looked around for them, apologizing the entire time. I reddened with embarrassment as my fruitless grasps searched in vain. Without my glasses, my sight range cuts off around a foot and a half from the tip of my nose. Just when I thought this day had reached its quota on heart pounding events.

"Wait," floated a soft voice, more serene than the most tenderly stroked stream in a renaissance painting.

My arms froze and I stood unsteadily from my kneeling position, attempting to cover up my blushed cheeks by rubbing an imaginary sore under my right eye. The prod of familiar plastic greeted my unoccupied hand. I hesitated in surprise, slowly pinching the glasses from the victim of my blundering stroll.

"I am so sorry," I spouted frantically. "That was totally my fault. I was just..."

As I placed the sight-blessing windows against my face, I strained to hold back from gasping at the beauty I had so heartlessly bowled into. The girl's large, violet eyes watched me with a mixture of fear and concern, hovering over pale cheeks dashed with scarlet. Long, flowing locks reached down to her waist, tinted in what looked like a shade of purple that matched her eyes. From the color palette of her uniform, consisting of a dark skirt, blouse, and red bow tie, I knew right away we shared a similar destination.

And she looked so familiar...


	2. Moderate Anxiety

"Kotonoha?" I yelped, pronouncing the name as best as I could. No, impossible, maybe she just looks alarmingly like her, huge eyes, unnaturally dyed hair and all.

"Ah!" she squeaked. The once subtle flush of her face now vibrant and alarming. She took a step back, her violet orbs avoiding my stare. "D-do I know you?"

The pieces fell into place and a few questions met with resolve. Everything looked enigmatic and synthetic, colors digitized like an anime. Whether I was dreaming or not, this universe contained the characters of School Days, or one of them at least. This girl with eyes the size of Texas, a tortured soul marked as one of the two main love interests of the main protagonist, whom I have not yet had the opportunity to bump into.

"No, um, I'm new here," I stumbled, keeping my distance. When the glare of the sun leaves her eyes, people die. "I think I, er, heard someone call your name the other day? While I was visiting the school." I mentally kicked myself for making statements in a questioning tone.

Damn wait, this is Japan. First names are for close friends and relatives, what was her family name? I usually have a hard enough time remembering the full name of the hero in the shows I watch. She looks so scared, am I that intimidating? No, of course, her history with other men wreaks of indecent looks and lewd words. She remained wary all the way up to high school, even of her future boyfriend, who lacked the proper patience with such a fragile flower. Complete ponce.

"Anyway," I muttered, slightly disturbed by the silence. I had no idea people more reserved than myself could possibly exist. "Are you headed for the train station?"

I took the slight millimeter movement of her head as a nod. Instantly, I abandoned all thoughts of finding the nearest call box. This mysterious situation called for personal investigation, I needed to scout out for the other characters. If this universe truly encapsulated the story of School Days, I could change history, observe these large-eyed beings and uncover their inner clockwork.

"Alrighty, um, ladies first," I grinned, the charming grin of a raving lunatic bent on tweaking with the lives of high school kids like lab rats. She never made eye contact, and as she passed, snagging my nostrils with the sweet blossoms of her perfume, I began to wonder. Am I entering the story from the beginning? So many alternate story lines, what continuity am I following? The manga? The show? One of the many routes in the game, or perhaps something different altogether? Ah, I'm giving myself a headache with all this potential evil. Under most circumstances, I pride myself in representing a morally sound man on a corrupt and chaotic planet. I could never purposely damage another person without proper reason, and even then it would take a severe amount of provocation. Unless one triggered something that particularly ground my gears, such as via adultery.

Our mechanical steps along the silent road pierced the misty morning air like pin pricks through a sheet of plastic foam. I made certain to leave a respectable ten feet between Kotonoha and myself, knowing that she took great discomfort in my presence. My wandering eye encountered difficulty in avoiding the small of her back, encased in her deep, plum splashed hair. How could a girl like her possibly feel secure wearing such a short skirt? An uncomfortable span of time dragged out before our first footsteps onto the station platform.

While Kotonoha expectedly knew how to handle acquiring a ticket for the train, my experience left me with slight mental scarring. How convenient that the matrix movie style method in which I could speak fluent Japanese did not account for literacy. After discovering a handful of yen in a wallet hiding in the pocket of my backpack, I underwent a scene of trial and error as the ticket vendor sat there, it's mechanical facade judging my flustered fumbling. Thankfully, I managed to catch a glimpse of Kotonoha working the proper ticket method. Had she a train pass in her possession, like the few business suits that marched by, my illiterate self would be dumbly sitting here, quite a ways up a river of fecal matter, lacking any sort of aquatic maneuvering utensil.

Now we wait. I stood a few yards down the edge of the platform away from the anime heroine, chancing half-second peeks at her proper posture. She took no notice, her attention fully fixed on a flip cell phone. I almost produced a loud, ungentlemanly snort at the ancient design of that thing. I forgot this story took place around six years ago. Out of the corner of my eye, I noticed someone else watching her, wearing the smallest smile, having an effect on me similar to punching my uvula. My neck prickled like a startled cat.

Ladies and gentlemen, I present to you the indecisive hero of School Days, Makoto Ito. I thank the creators that his simple name remained easy enough to remember, the only name I could fully recall. The cesspool of contradicting emotions erupting from my core at his presence brought me to physically flinch and clench my teeth. This guy could arguably take all the responsibility for the tortured minds and bodies of multiple women, innocent Kotonoha leading the herd. He may not have personally wielded a weapon, but he drove them to violent insanity with his incessant cheating.

Time to activate my reconnaissance powers. I backed away from the platform edge, to the point where I faced everyone's backs, and paced inconspicuously over to the unsuspecting protagonist. If, by chance, I had fallen into the beginnings of this story, this creep with the earphones would soon aim his primitive cell phone at Kotonoha and capture her unassuming innocence, utilizing the photo as his phone's wallpaper for some sort of ridiculous charm. I silently snickered at the thought. According to the new-age myth in the show, if you plant a photograph of the object of your affections as your phone's background and keep it out of sight from anyone for a length of time, your feelings would not go unrequited. Silly, blissful kids, and now I was one of them.

I stood a few feet behind my prey now, observing like some sort of safari expert on the savannah. I just needed an oversuspicious, dome-shaped tan hat and my presence would be complete. A large white mustache would be cool too. An exclamation of excitement came dangerously close to fruition when Makoto elevated his phone and took a snap of the girl. Sneaky bastard, not a single person noticed. Would I be considered a person in this world, or an alien?

So now I knew the feeling of watching an anime in person, from the sidelines. An unsettling feeling, seeing these familiar events unfold minus the subtle ambient music and character narration. At that moment, my mission smacked me with an overwhelming fist of cobblestone. Ensuring these kids on a proper path with little pain and no bloodshed without taking the shape of an ever-present cameraman deemed a task edging on the impossible. Direct intervention would be inevitable, much to my chagrin. I would need to associate myself with these crazies. That meant potential conversations, which in turn hinted at possible friendships, leading to unwanted relationships, and likely ending in my untimely death at the hands of someone on a passionate, vengeful rampage. Wow, I could die a gut-splattering, blood-spewing death, an uncommon revelation. I should probably feel less manic about this.

The cement beneath my feet began to rumble and the handful of people previously waiting idly began huddling around the platform's edge. I acted quickly, ensnaring my subject in my line of sight. The train screeched to a halt, the sliding doors gave way, and the passengers filed in. Just another day at the office worker production factory. Vibrant advertisements blanketed the entire train, and I could not read a single one. Inside, the compartment I entered seemed reasonably populated, forcing me to remain on my feet. There were a few free seats, but a wall of statued businessmen guarded them. My unsteady limbs cursed their mundane presence.

As luck would have it, I ended up in an agonizing position, smushed against a wall next to my quarry. Direct contact did not actually occur between anyone and myself, but having so many people less than five feet around me sure felt crowded. When the hell did the story add the rest of Japan to its character list? I weighed this as a good chance to strike up a conversation with this kid, hopefully his earphones would not provide too much of a problem.

"Excuse me," I approached, prodding the spiky-haired teen on the shoulder. He turned to me and quickly retracted a plug from his ear. The sight of his huge amber eyes flashed a few scenes in my mind, notably images of them staring, unseeing and fish-like, blankly into infinity. My mission will be to try to keep that from becoming a reality.

"Hi," I chimed in a voice unintentionally too high. "I'm new to the area, you wouldn't happen to be a student of Sakakino, would you?"

"Oh, um, hello," he replied, not even attempting to hide his surprise. "Yeah, I'm a student there." He visibly looked back and forth between our matching uniforms, trying to point out the obvious to my feigned thickheadedness.

"Rupert Hudson, pleasure to make your acquaintance," I sang, holding my hand forward in a friendly gesture. Why did I feel so empowered over this situation? Wait, remember where you are, idiot? Last names first.

"I mean Hudson, Rupert," I repeated. As funny as it would be, I did not care to hear myself addressed as 'Mr. Rupert'.

Makoto eyed my hand with slight apprehension before awkwardly replicating my motion. I took his hand and enacted a firm shake., forgetting for a moment that handshakes did not dominate introductions in this country.

"Makoto Ito," he muttered uneasily.

"Sorry," I lied. "I should start practicing my bowing. Keeps slipping my mind that I'm not exactly in Kansas anymore."

"Haha, no problem," he chuckled nervously. "I've only ever seen that in movies, so it's kinda cool. What year are you in?"

"Uhh."

Huh. That thought never crossed my mind. Quickly, Hudson, think. Has anything alluded to my academic position in this school? I reached into the side pocket of my backpack, containing the life saving wallet from earlier. My identification stared back at me, a blank, dark haired head surrounded by all kana lettering; scribbles. I cannot begin to describe the strange feeling of seeing recent pictures of yourself in which you seem fully aware that they are taking place, but still trigger no recent memory banks.

Thank the powers that be for the universal number system. Between all the unrecognizable symbols, I could read "1991_07_21". If my previous knowledge, stating that this all indeed took place six years prior, is to be trusted, then I am currently fifteen years of age. If I had to guess, I would rate myself as physically belonging to the freshman year, but I think Japanese high schools arrange their grades differently. I never actually took the time to read up in depth on their schooling system.

After my brief investigation, I grew conscious of the fact that I had perpetrated the personal information digging in front of the quiet bachelor, who wore a mask of utter confusion at my antics. I began picturing this entire ordeal as a very involved science experiment, curious as to what quizzical responses I could achieve from further erratic behavior. Everything would be forgiven under my label as a foreigner, I could get away with animalistic outbursts. Would anyone fall for it if I stated that by bleating like a goat, I was exclaiming my love for hamburgers? An apologetic smile creeped along my features as I pocketed the wallet nonchalantly.

"Heh, just wanted to make sure they printed that correctly on my student I.D." I laughed in a plastic manner. Before he could question what a student I.D. was, I interrupted his train of thought with my answer. "If I'm fifteen, what year would that make me?"

"Ehh," he hummed, apparently disregarding my strange lack of knowledge. "I think we would both be in the same year. I thought I heard something about a transfer student to my class, that must be you."

"Chance encounters like this don't get any slimmer than that," I joked. "Hey, they're not gonna make me introduce myself in front of class, are they?"

The atmosphere between us eased up as I loosened his jaw with question after question, soaking up as much information as I could about this unfamiliar setting. According to Makoto, we belonged to first year's class three. I voiced my concern over not knowing how to read hieroglyphics, and in return he warmly proposed that he and a friend assist me with homework. The offer took me by surprise, I never would have predicted that this guy held kindness for anyone without a feminine physique. Were school work an actual concern, I would glow with sincere gratitude.

During the conversation, however, his attention would sidetrack every minute or so, his eyes darting to an area off to the side toward the center of the rail car. I decided at that moment to question him about the cute girl with the long hair, well aware of the entire situation. In a coy manner, he whispered that her name was Katsura, and that he knew little about her other than the fact that she belonged in class four. I did not press him on his feelings for her, I needed to gain his trust, not give him the impression that I stalk.

I just barely kept my footing as the train began scraping to a stop. My companion's shifting revealed this stop to detail the end of our travel, and I followed him out as the doors ground open. More student uniforms crowded the sidewalk we trailed, and after a brisk ten minute stroll, I found myself in a sea of black suits and blouses, standing outside the entrance of Sakakino Academy. My mouth slacked slightly, impressed at the professional presentation of the tall structure. I had no idea a high school could appear so clean and sophisticated. I took note of the gated rooftop. If I recall correctly, someone had been driven to suicide off of it in one of the game's realities.

Makoto instructed me on my locker, indicating what I should keep in my pack and what to stow away for later. Mainly, the locker would hold my P.E. clothes, which I had no prior knowledge of owning, and my lunch. He informed me that teachers came to the classrooms as opposed to my idea of the typical American school where the students inherited the exercise. I liked this place already. I've had my fill of walking for the day.

"I guess you can sit there," Makoto pointed distractedly from his seat at the back of the class. His eyes glued to his phone, and I knew why. I nodded in reply and pulled out a chair from the empty desk directly in front of him. Normally, I would wonder why the seat next to him would not be preferable, but I already knew the answer to that. The other girl.

"Makoto!"

And speak of the devil. Even from the other side of the room, that piercing greeting could cause anyone's leg to instinctively reflex and bang a shin against a desk. I chanced a look around the room as I massaged my bruised leg, hoping no one noticed. The owner of the cry skipped over and planted her belongings on the portion of Makoto's desk opposite of his end. Her smile shined a few watts more than the sun as she approached her classmate. After a few minutes of their bickering over the boy's phone, I almost decided to initiate my introduction when she finally noticed me.

"Hey," she called. "I've never seen you before."

"Ah, I nearly forgot," replied Makoto, saving the girl from an unnecessarily sarcastic rebuttal from my end. "This is Hudson Rupert, a new student from the United States. Hudson, meet..."

The final portion of the School Days love triangle. If you refrained from blaming everything on Makoto, then you probably poured some of it on her. As Makoto's closest friend, the brunette hid deep, painful feelings from him, caring for him deeply from the start yet, understandably, lacking the courage to disclose them. The poor girl had unintentionally discovered his crush on Katsura by checking his phone's wallpaper, which I believe transpired just now. She helped the boy gain the idol of his affections as a girlfriend, even when it hurt her and squeezed the tears from her eyes. Then she decided to start up a braver act, seducing Makoto into a more libido benefiting relationship, behind his girlfriend's back. Talk about high school drama.

"Saionji Sekai, a close friend of mine."

I decided at this moment that I should finally inherit a little cultural sensitivity and bulk up on my Japanese etiquette. Pulling myself from my seat, I made a curt bow in the girl's direction. No clue as to how far I should bow, I settled on bending until I strained at my limit, narrowly missing their desk. I fear I garnered one or ten curious looks from around the room, the students suddenly aware of the new face among their numbers.

"It is truly an honor to meet you, Miss Saionji." I brown nosed, eyes staring straight down at the simple tile. Is that an eraser? When I looked up, she was elbowing her friend in the side.

"Makoto," she teased. "You could learn a thing or two from this guy about how to talk to a lady."

"Yeah, too bad I don't know any," he grinned back.

As I laughed at their head punching and friendly bickering, I realized how strong their compatible aura would shine from the view third party. They clearly cared for each other, how had this guy not fallen for her in the first place? He loved with his eyes of course, but Saionji's looks could easily compete with any pretty girl I have seen. I shook my head slowly, these blissful kids had no idea what to look for in a partner, not that I have ever found it.

Time in the bustling classroom seemed to freeze when a man, who looked like the other starched coat wearers on the train, schlepped in, a suitcase and papers crowding his arms. A couple students clambered to his aid and guided him to the front desk. From the verbal sighs and crying chairs echoing around the room, I judged that class would soon begin. My heart pounded, I sincerely hoped formal introductions would deem unnecessary. Talking in front of crowds always set my stomach on edge.

"It seems we have a new student," declared the sweaty looking professor, wiping moisture from his glasses. "Please, stand and introduce yourself," he caught me like a mindless deer before an oncoming truck in the dead of night.

Why did my intuition have to be right? I shot up awkwardly, forgetting about the chair I sat on, sending it wobbling back a whole foot. Let me tell you how that whole 'imagine they're all in their underwear' routine never worked for me. Does it honestly work for anyone? Hopefully I can keep the stuttering to a minimum, but this was an exceptionally unnerving situation. Holy hell, their eyes poked icicles into the core of my soul. It didn't help that they rivaled dinner plates in their size.

"H-hello," so much for keeping down the stuttering. "My name is R-Hudson Rupert, and I am from the United States of America."

A few quiet comments reached my ears, something about my hair being messy, reflectively sending one of my hands to smooth it out. I cut the action off faster than if my hair were on fire when I heard someone admire my looks. Did they call me cute? Compliments turn me into a huge sucker. Do not betray me now, facial blood vessels. I nudged an eye over to the teacher, making the biggest effort to telepathically alert him to my social distress. I wiggled my eyebrows, scrunched my cheeks, but nothing got to him.

"Tell us something about yourself, Mr. Hudson," smiled the teacher, a cheesy, manure-devouring set of teeth unlike any I have ever seen. "Interests? Hobbies?"

My opinion of this man leveled off somewhere around my distaste for people that wear department store brand trilbies and v-necks. I thought people here held privacy as one of their highest attributes. Do we not have class work to get to? He probably just needs time to set up, that desk is sagging under that pile of white discord.

"Eh," I could not disclose my nerdy hobbies, I needed to keep in a favorable light in this school. I scanned the room in a frantic attempt at an idea, and I glimpsed the open phone of a bored student. "Pictures!" I exploded, probably dropping my hypothesized I.Q. a few hundred points.

"I-I mean, I love photography," I corrected, earning a few raised brows. "I used to have a camera that I took everywhere with me, but it was lost in the airport luggage system." I cannot recall having voiced such a fat, unimpressive lie.

"I'm sorry to hear that," replied the teacher with a voice dripping of insincerity. "Perhaps you should look into joining the photography club. You may take your seat."

I almost fell and broke my tailbone on the hard floor when I forgot my seat had flown out of range. The next hour could have embroidered itself as the most boring class period ever to numb my brain, especially with the drone of useless knowledge and unreadable textbooks, but I managed to occupy myself with the neighboring sights. Was it just me, or did the show seem to drastically exaggerate the ratio of girls to boys? The black suits nearly matched the girls in number, yet nearly every character in School Days is female. I guess I'm over analyzing it. I think I spotted another one of the secondary characters among the suits, but I could not for the life of me remember his name.

During these intervals of monotone lectures would suffice as the ideal time to think up a strategy to tackle this tangled romantic jungle. First things first, who should I lean Makoto toward? Would it even be that easy? Even now, Katsura loves him, an undying affection that I cannot fathom. She proved it in every outcome I have witnessed. When she becomes aware of his cheating nature, she either blames the other girl or herself, never her unfaithful boyfriend. In fact, both of the main heroines hold legitimate feelings for him, though Saionji can and will blame him for his misdeeds. If the events so far are any hint, this will be the day she decides to help him pursue his feelings for Katsura. In fact...

A shuffling of paper on the desk to my six o'clock perked my ears. Of course, the silent written notes between Makoto and Saionji, discussing how to deal with the lovestruck fool's feelings. That argument they held when she first came in, that must have been when she saw his phone, uncovering his secret crush. But according to the show, everything up until now supposedly transpired on the first day of the school semester, but seeing as these two already know each other so well, the setting has been slightly altered. Even still, for some reason Makoto still knows nothing about Katsura, so that means Saionji has yet to set off on her journey to acquire information for him. Crap, that means the lunch between the three of them is today, but it's not set in stone just yet. Should I try to stop it?

"So soon!?" shot a female voice, blowing a hole in my ear from behind.

"Is there a problem?" asked the disturbed teacher.

"Eh, no, sorry."

That would be Saionji's reaction to Makoto informing her the she had uncovered his cell phone wallpaper the first day of the charm. Now she would start playing the role of cupid. I feel the strong inclination to keep this guy away from Katsura, and I believe Saionji fits his impatient personality more snugly. I'll let the story unroll a little further before I decide to jump into action, maybe I can join the lunch as a fourth wheel. Before I knew it, class had ended and the room suddenly burst into life as the teacher left, some students standing and walking out the door. I turned to the duo behind me.

"What's going on?" I asked. "I thought we stayed while the teachers moved?"

"Ten minute break between classes," Makoto replied cheerfully.

"I see," I stood up. "I'm gonna go look for the facilities and get used to the layout of this place, you two try not to flirt too hard while I'm gone."

I cherished the looks of surprise and outbursts of "what are you talking about?" before turning on my heels and squeezing passed the class and out the door. My bodily functions had gone completely unnoticed until now, an unrelenting pressure building in my lower abdomen. The halls bustled with life, kids taking every advantage they could of their break. I received many side glances from students I recognized from my class. My search shifted into a frantic frenzy of running when five minutes ebbed away without any sign of the restroom. Am I running in circles? I needed to ask directions, but most of the students had already returned to class. I turned another corner and sighed at the sight of a group of girls chatting loudly outside if a classroom.

"Excuse me!" I called, running down the hall toward them. I found it amusing how they all mechanically turned in unison to my voice. Oh, more recognizable faces from the anime that I could not put names to. This girl with the ponytail, I think she provided much more to the story then the other three girls, but no time for pondering that now.

"Hello, um, can you tell me where the restroom is? I'm new here," I tried my best to ignore the rapidly intensifying pain.

The ponytailed brunette locked eyes on me while the other girls giggled, likely at my twitching legs.

"You have a weird accent," she stated, not answering my dire question. "Are you from another country?"

"Yes, I am from the U.S.," I replied with a deteriorating calm. "My name is Hudson. Toilets? Please?"

For a second, I thought she had finally decided to grant my wish, until one of her pointy-haired friends popped with another question. "Hey, what year and class are you?" called the girl with the yellow headband. What is their deal? No way on this sunny earth would I get back to class on time now.

"Year one, class three. Would you care for anything else? Social security? Credit card number? Shoe size?" I grumbled sarcastically. My temper always remained in check around complete strangers, but when I found myself in a hurry, I sometimes become blinded to my actions.

"Sorry," the girl laughed dismissively. "Otome here likes foreign guys. Bathrooms are down that hall on the first right."

"Uh, thank you."

Great, now my bladder aches  _and_  I'm blushing. I scuttled down the hall, cries of embarrassment echoing from the girl with the ponytail. A fleeting memory bank in my mind renewed as I found another name to add to my list of encountered characters. If I recall correctly, Otome was the name of another girl with a heart burning for Makoto's embrace, but she received much less attention in comparison to the other two heroines. An odd turn of events considering that she knew Makoto before high school, Saionji and Katsura having only met him this year.

Hmm, she likes foreign guys? I don't remember that ever being said. They were probably just teasing her. Ah, there you are you beautiful, overly hidden room of porcelain relief.

When I exited the stall, my feet clung to the tile at the sight of the short figure standing by the sinks. For a moment, I thought a girl had mistakenly walked in, or worse, I had chosen the wrong restroom. The student stood at the sink, washing a pair of perfectly circular glasses that measured even larger than the eyes they aided. I trudged closer to the mirror, trying my hardest not to stare, and failing miserably. I don't think I'll get used to floundering into these familiar faces that once graced my thoughts as only fiction. This kid just might be the answer I have been searching for, the long awaited key to this dangerous teen angst puzzle, and all I needed to do was provide my guidance.


	3. The Sinister Luncheon

Yuuki, the protagonist of one of the School Days sequels, stood before me. He had a story I would rather not dwell on for any period of time, but I empathized with him. In fact, we both had nearly identical goals. Through an unforeseen turn of events, this kid found out Makoto's intentions of playing the hearts of vulnerable women to satiate his lust. Yuuki, bless his soul, tried to stop the madness, with the well-being of the girls on his mind, Katsura above all. Not unlike others before him, he unwittingly developed a crush on her, the factor that tied him into the story in the first place.

I'll just say that, with his small stature and feminine looks, one thing led to another, and he developed a farfetched plan to impersonate a female student with the idea of wooing Makoto and then revealing him as the floozy he was. I lack the knowledge of any of his story's possible endings, but I do know that this kid endured more than I could ever put up with. Now that I think about it, he could be the perfect match for Katsura, and he would make an excellent ally, someone I could fully trust to be supportive of my views. I would leave out the part where I'm from another world, of course. Then again, there already exists someone that, unbeknownst to him, pines for his attention to the mad extreme. I would hate to tear that up. Why must everything be so emotionally complicated? I guess pairing him with Katsura isn't the best plan. My mental progress on the subject screeches like the busted brakes of a city bus as it comes to a full stop once again.

I decided to leave it for later. I waltzed up to the sink by his side and rinsed my hands with a liquid soap that smelled of a curious foliage. He worked at the school library, so once my rattled brain has settled, I'll pay his workstation a visit. For now, I treated him as any other fellow bathroom patron by ignoring his presence entirely, though as I walked out, I could not help but notice him staring into the mirror through his enormous circular glasses, having not set a finger on the faucet handle. Katsura and Makoto had not even begun to date and this guy already wore the troubled wrinkles of an old man.

As suspected, I returned to class tardy, but the new teacher understood my situation with open arms of kindness. I thanked her for her hospitality and returned to my seat. This system of teachers moving from class to class rather than the students could grow on me. Makoto and Saionji both threw me a wave and I returned in kind. I noticed the writing all over the papers between them, clearly not class work.

"If you don't mind me asking, where do you guys eat lunch?" I inquired, already aware of their plans. After an eternity of teacher dribbling, noon finally decided to erupt from the heavens and grant the school body a brief break, leaving the room mostly empty. The rooftop would stage the first lunch between the potential love triangle, and without my intervention, things could go predictably horrendous.

"I usually head over to the cafeteria," Makoto replied, looking rather unsure. "But Sekai told me she had a surprise lunch on the roof and went on ahead to wait for me there."

"Do you mind if I eat with you guys?" I asked modestly, scoping out the barren classroom. "I could share the lunch I brought with me, I don't have much of an appetite today." For once, I spoke not out of politeness, but out of truth. I could not begin to imagine consuming anything under my present position.

"Yeah, sure," he replied, shuffling away his papers. "I doubt Sekai would mind, she seems to think you're alright."

I shudder inwardly. Should I be so cursed as to garner the feelings of one of those temptresses, I might as well rip out my own throat before they could. When I was stitched together and given life, someone decided to leave out the boyfriend material. I do not believe I would even need to cheat on a girl to drive her to my death.

"I'm just trying to make friends," I laughed through my nose.

The stairs to the roof marinated in the darkness of one of the halls, looming like a sentry, passively watching most students scuffle by. Most, aside from the two men standing before them. Many an event played out before and after treading these steps, some even on them. I could still turn back now, cut off all relations with these crazy kids and learn up on my katakana, or become a tireless vagabond, eager to explore this strange animated planet. I wonder if there exists an animated version of my original home.

Makoto took the lead, clacking one dress shoe after the other on the asphalt of the stairs. The only proper illumination gleamed from the small window in the heavily built door at the top. I may have seen what looked like the red lettering of a warning sign, likely trying to alert trespassers to blade wielding women. In all seriousness, that did look like a hazard sign.

"Are students usually allowed on the roof like this?" I questioned with the slightest smidgen of concern.

"Nope," he stated up front. "But Sekai managed to get the keys when she told the school she wanted to revive the astronomy club."

"Wow," I breathed, knowing well that the mentioned club never received such treatment. "Quite the troublemaker."

"You're telling me," he snickered, shaking his head at invisible memories.

"So," I whispered hotly. "How long have you and Saionji been going out?"

Time to start picking a pairing and not looking back since my cocky brain has actually swayed from the route of procrastination for once. I agree, my plan has a few holes, especially in the parts where I have no idea where I'm going with this, but for now this will be the best outcome. These two have previously befriended each other and bonded to some extent. If I can keep him from involving himself with Katsura, then when she finds out her love carries the label of unrequited, it will hurt much less and hopefully refrain from sending her into a fit of unquenchable insanity. I just need to plant in his head the notion that he needs to look at Saionji. Once they are fixated, perhaps I can work on helping Katsura as a secondary objective.

"W-what are you talking about?" he flustered, halting mid step just before the metal door. "Sekai and I are just friends."

"Hmm," I pretend to ponder. "You two are awfully close to just be friends. Does she already have a boyfriend?"

"N-no," he stammered. "Of course not. Why?"

"Oh, you know," I smirked cheekily, trying my hardest not to choke on my over-the-top oily manner. "If you don't act quick, she'll be taken before you know it."

"That's none of my concern," he huffed, turning his head from my view. "She can go out with anyone she wants, I'm not her type. Besides, there's already someone I like."

"Uh, and who is that?" I pry, trying to peer around him and snatch a look at his miserable expression.

"Like I would tell you," he scoffed. "We just met today, in fact this whole conversation is weird."

I needed to pull something off, bait him into chasing Saionji, but what on earth could gravitate his attention? What blaring problem, other than mass cheating, did he flaunt in the anime? I need to empathize with this kid. What faults do I carry? My eyes widened as I remembered the heart-faced angel I became infatuated with in high school, making face with that jerk football player in the hallway, instilling a stinging emotion inside my chest like no other. Jealousy.

"What if I told you a secret in exchange for yours?" I risked. I needed to lie again, bigger than anything I've fibbed about. So much could go wrong if I tried this, and every chance I had would end as soon as it did. "A secret about Saionji."

He turned now, his brow knitted against the dimness of the sun that eavesdropped from the door. By the look he wore, I had this kid by the nape of his neck and he had no clue. From his burning glare, I might have felt a tinge of intimidation, had I not known this guy to lug around the spine of a broken jellyfish.

"How can you know anything about her?" he asked, trying to sound nonchalant but instead only megaphoning his curiosity. "You've never met her before today."

"Let's make a deal," I grin. "If I tell you something about Saionji that shocks you, then you have to tell me who you like."

He crossed his arms and thought for a moment. I could just nearly see the burning smoke pump out of his simple brain, clearly overworked. "Alright, it's a deal. But you really have to surprise me, and you'll have to prove it."

"Of course," I laughed, crying on the inside. This is such I stupid idea, I'm screwed. I took a few light steps back and swiped my eyes up and down the corridor, making sure none could hear the twaddle about to spew from my wicked mouth. I do not doubt that there exists a simpler way of achieving this kid's trust, but at the moment, this feels most convincing. I should have taken theater in high school. Returning up the stairs to Makoto, I leaned in to his expecting form and placed my mouth an inch from his earlobe.

"I'm dating Saionji."

A silence unlike any to burden the many awkward pauses in my life engulfed our little standoff. It took everything within my power to keep from bursting with laughter and admitting my jest. His eyes lit up with a rainbow emotions, prominently featuring what looked to be a strong mixture of anger and confusion.

"That's impossible," he tried to laugh."You just arrived today, so there's no way you two could have had the time to..."

"I spoke with her between classes and she accepted my confession," I interrupted with a shrug, blushing the blush of a bad liar. "But that's our secret and she doesn't want anyone to know. So in exchange, can you tell me your secret?"

He proceeded to open and close his mouth a few times over as his simultaneously jealous and skeptical mind attempted to decipher the new information. I readied my reflexes, foreseeing a possible physical retaliation. Surely primitive instinct would overcome him and the heated punches would soon follow.

"Prove it," he sniped, catching my rigid joints off guard. "Prove it to me, or I'll ask her myself, then you'll be in trouble regardless."

His mischievous smile told me how unaware of the trouble I would marinate in should such information reach that potential killer. I shuddered at the thought.

"Why would you ask me if I was going out with her if you already were?" he jabbed. For a person that hates conversation, I sure do open my mouth more than I should.

"Because..." I began, looking off to the side and breaking eye contact. My brain operated on fumes now, sputtering and struggling to crank out a coherent thought. I was in deep. "I'm a jerk, that's why."

I could see in the retraction of his neck that he failed to predict that answer, which knocked his jaw loose and propped up an eyebrow. But, what do I say now? How can I prove that which holds no truth? Why could he not just blindingly accept my lies so we could work together in getting his sad self a date? I needed to stall this for as long as possible, and maybe hope for a miracle or three.

"Let's continue this later," I blurted, trying to push him up to the door. "I'm sure  _my_ girl Saionji has been waiting longer than she should for us." If I have to go in deep, I might as well lay it on thick.

He only replied with a furrowed brow and a stiff, suspicious nod. Maybe I could falsify some hints at our make-believe relationship and snare this kid in my rickety trap. We clambered up the remaining steps and pushed out through the heavy metal door into the shimmering sunlight. A small cry came from somewhere off to my left as I squeezed the brightness from my lids.

The scene painted brightly before us would fail to alarm anyone under most circumstances. Two school girls perched upon a sturdy bench, eating lunch, nothing more. I, however, knew the problems that came when this specific crowd gathered, and it set off every alarm in my head. Makoto seemed even more surprised than myself, seeing as he decided to vocalize his feelings.

"K-Katsura?" he shrilled, a tone that shook my frame with a wave of embarrassment.

He made a backwards move for the door but I blocked his path, feeling a sudden surge of black evil course through my veins. I forgot he would not have expected his crush's presence at this lunch. This could work in my favor, if my vague memory of this scenario panned out properly. I held little confidence though, as every detail already seemed more inaccurate than not in terms of the show. I guess my presence has snowballed into something akin to the butterfly effect.

"Where are you off to so suddenly," I asked innocent enough. "You should not keep ladies with surprises waiting, especially when one's my... significant other."

I made sure that only Makoto could hear that last bit, and apparently it did the trick. He released a sigh that whooshed out like a busted pressure valve and awkwardly tiptoed in the other direction. I followed after, concealing my light-footed approach with a posture of false determination, lunch box swinging in my hand.

Saionji greeted us with her trademark excitement, shoulder-length locks bobbing about. Man she's loud. The bubbly female showed some surprise at my attendance, but cheerily welcomed me. She ended up dictating our seating arrangement on a single crowded bench while I eyeballed the perfectly good second bench taunting me just inches away. From left to right sat Katsura, Makoto, Saionji, and myself. From my seat, the action all appeared so far away. I noted the fleeting peeks Katsura made in my direction every so often, and I tried my best not to look like I noticed. She remembered my awkward presence from this morning.

Katsura had clearly planned prior to the meeting, bringing along a basket filled with clean cut sandwiches. I felt my appetite return with full force at the sight of them, stomach rumbling with anticipation. Finally, food that looked familiar. Even I, being a surprise addition, joined the crew in partaking in her treat. Her offering of my portion felt like a sort of apology for earlier, though I hardly deserved one. While they were all exchanging pleasantries and gratitude, with Makoto sitting rigid and sweaty, I forgot about my packed lunch and ripped a crunchy bite out of my share.

Yeah, that crunchy part was the first sign that this woman had no earthly business in the culinary arts. It took every ounce of my manners not to gag and send the demon concoction sailing off the roof and onto some unfortunate soul below. What the hell would give this abomination such a gritty texture? It's like she rolled it in a sandbox and lathered it with pepper spray mustard. Was that mustard? I don't even know. If there exists any meat in this thing, it would be best if I never found out. Chewing tin foil just might prove as a preferable alternative to this.

I thanked my lucky stars that I sat so out of line with everyone, giving me the chance to force the rest of the horrid meal through the roof gate behind us like beef through a grinder. The remaining glob in my mouth rolled off my tongue onto the cement. You would have to be looking for it to find it. I smirked, none were any the wiser. I can be so smooth sometimes, there should be a law against it. Everyone deserves a good self back patting every so often.

By the time those two began taking their first bites, I already sat patiently, waiting with a dark gleam in my eyes to see their predictably amusing faces. My pupils dilated and my palms sweat as the bread neared their mouths in unison. As soon as their mouths bricked shut on that first audible crunch, I lost it. I had to fake up a sudden bout of coughing and turn the other way while they tried to explain themselves and avoid injuring the poisonous chef's feelings.

I wiped mirthful tears from under my glasses while everyone had started panicking. The knight in shining armor, on a quest to pluck away the long-haired lady's heart, had finally found an opportunity to show off. During a sudden lapse in judgment, he decided to stuff down all of the leftover sandwiches at once in order brush away any suspicion that his love interest's cooking had spawned from the underworld. This promptly sent him into a series of sputtering chokes.

As the four of us calmed down after that little episode, I began to wonder if my chance at gaining Makoto's trust would ever come. He should be grateful I retained my knowledge of the Heimlich maneuver and saved his sorry rump. In fact, I failed to receive a single shred of acknowledgment for clearing this poor sap's airway of devil food. These kids are unbelievable.

"Oh, I just remembered," Saionji announced, standing abruptly and smoothing the invisible wrinkles out of her skirt. "I have to pick something up from the library." She cast a glance in my direction at the other end of the bench, a small shadow of worry on her brow. I questioned her curious stare in silence, admiring the cuteness that came from her pursed lips. Did that thought actually just occur to me? Gross.

"Hey, Rupert," she beamed out of nowhere. Hearing my name so out-of-the-blue sent a surge through my limbs and I had to suppress a flinch. "Would you like to come with me? I could show you around and get you acquainted."

Her tone jingled with a goody goody sweetness that wore away at my ankles, shaking my frame with a strange fear. I could feel Makoto's unbelieving eyes burning into the flesh of my right cheek. Lady luck had finally flashed my poor soul with a generous helping of her namesake. This just might work out, and when it did, I shall crown myself a genius lifesaver. I recall Saionji using a different excuse in an alternate setting, but I would settle for this.

"Sure," I piped with a smile that I hoped captured every ounce of charm my pathetic looks had to offer. I lurched from my seat with a quick push from the bench. "That sounds like a great idea. I'll see you guys later. Thanks again for the- err, lunch, Katsura." I took her silent blush as an adequate motion from a person of her caliber.

I waved at the awkward couple on the roof as I scurried to the exit, half-tripping in my glee. With every step I pictured the sound of a grand finale cannon booming to a classic Tchaikovsky piece, nailing in my victory. This shall remain one of my top moments of glory, ranking just below the time I genuinely made a girl laugh after a sarcastic comment I made in high school. I mentally captured the look of disbelief on Makoto's face as I followed his friend inside, replying to him with my best "Was I right, or was I right?" eyebrow quirk before vanishing into the dark void of the school.

When the slab of metal clanged shut, I nearly fell straight down as I sagged with relief, slumping with my back against the door down to the floor. A few seconds passed before the shining eyes drilling into my form from atop a pair of hands set akimbo caught my attention.


	4. Heartfelt Insensitivity

"You and Makoto sure became friends fast," came a voice that I nearly forgot about.

I jerked my head up at her voice, failing to hide my surprise. I could only imagine how silly I looked falling to the ground with the release of a pent up sigh. An embarrassed chuckle left my lungs as my knees creaked my frame back up. I brushed off the creases in my slacks.

""Friends" might be too strong of a word," I sniffed. "Rather, I would say we're more like acquaintances. Acquaintances with conflicting interests that compel me to intervene and find a compromise, even when the solution provides my opponent with greater benefits than myself."

My vain ramblings fell upon deaf ears as Saionji gave me a look reserved for someone with a visible deformity. She scanned me with curious eyes and held a lopsided grin etched with slight pity. Why I decided to throw so much compromising information at her I'll never know, but I'm glad she had no idea what I just spouted. To her it sounded as though I had just tossed out a ton of useless babble. I could never hold a facade of confidence for very long in front of people.

By now we had left the stairs and headed down a hallway I assumed led to our destination, marching only to the tempo of our clacking shoes. Where did most people eat lunch? Oh, that's right, there's a cafeteria. I began to wonder what Japanese cafeteria food tasted like, but concluded that there was no time for that. I had no idea how long lunch would last, but I felt its end slowly creeping up on us.

I guess now would be as good a time as any to start bringing Saionji under my puppet strings. Working out the rest of my plan with Makoto would have to come later. His rooftop lunch with Katsura just better remain as innocent as I believe it was. My memory on the show's details was starting to haze up.

"So," I attempted at an icebreaker. "Do we really have the time to go to the library before lunch is over?"

Saionji stopped at this. She looked at me and switched to a face like I had told a disgusting but funny joke, obviously unsure of what I meant. Coupled with that silly strand of hair bobbing from the top of her head like an antennae, she painted a precise portrait of how innocent looks can deceive so easily. I imagined a bloody scream in the distance.

"O-of course we have time," she laughed dismissively. "Why would I be coming out here otherwise?" An uncomfortable leg fidget whispered a different story brewing in her head. I admit, prancing about and watching these kids squirm while fully aware of their problems did feel empowering, but I needed to cut to the chase with her.

"Look," I whispered gravely, throwing quick glances around the hallway. "I know why you really left the roof and wanted me to come along." No holding back. It's not like I have to tell her all the details, that would condemn any further conversation anyway. Her stern gaze locked on my unsuspecting frame, slapping me right off the top of my confidence surf. If I freeze up now, I can kiss this plot good bye.

"You're kinda weirding me out, new guy," she pointed with suspicious eyes. "I'll admit it, I just want to give them room to get closer together, and we were in the way. Don't let him know I told you, but he really likes Katsura." She whispered that last bit with an evil grin.

Of course I knew about Makoto's crush, and I also know about yours. I needed to get her to admit her feelings for this kid before he went too far. For my plan to work without too many hitches, I needed to place myself in the favor of both parties, or at least convince them that they could rely on me. I needed to get these kids together.

"But WHY are you helping him?" I asked, raising my voice slightly. "People don't usually help other people with relationship problems on a whim."

"Because we're friends of course," she dismissed, her face lined with the smallest tinge of rose. "He's hopeless otherwise, and this is none of your business."

"Oh, but it is my business," I smirked, not knowing what I was saying. She was right, of course. I had no business meddling in these kid's affairs, but there was no time for second thoughts now. "I'm friends with the guy as well, I too wish for him to live a physically painless love-life." You murderer. "And while I may not seem like it at the moment, I'm here to help you both out."

She stared stared at me with a tiny, angered pout. "What do you mean by that? And stop acting like you're so cool."

"Your feelings, Saionji," I sighed, finally giving up on any dramatic pacing. "Why are you helping him date another girl when you want him just as badly?" Blech. I cringed at the corny sound of my own voice.

She suddenly appeared frantic, throwing feverish looks up and down the corridor, as if I had just recounted an entry from her diary. Her pallor deepened into a deep crimson and she laughed nervously. Her eyes no longer took interest in my direction, instead looking everywhere else.

"Y-you're crazy!" she stuttered unconvincingly. "I don't like Makoto that way, we're just friends. I mean, even if I did, there's no way I could compete with Katsura. But I wouldn't want to, since I don't like him like that, especially with that dumb vacant look he always has and his jelly backbone."

Bravo on that overreaction, miss. You would think these kids knew that if you wanted to conceal your thoughts, you should refrain from getting so worked up about it. I'm a little embarrassed at how obvious she is.

"I don't think I can believe you," I dismissed, very sure of myself. Her face twitched.

"Really?" she squeaked unimpressed. "And what makes you so cocky?"

"Would you like me to list my reasons?"

She nodded challengingly, still unsure about the whole ordeal. Alright, to them I've only been here a few hours, but I know their story. Even if from her perspective I've only been here a short time, she still cannot deny the facts I'm about to lay before her.

"The way you look at him," I began, "How your eyes glue to Makoto the second he enters a room."

Saionji glared at me. "Do you watch m-"

"How your mouth takes off at a million miles a second when you two talk, like on the roof just now," I continued, unfaltering. I needed to keep my train of thought from derailing. Most of these details were being made up on the spot.

"I don't-"

"When he's near, your face reddens against your will. You become jittery and energetic, but your mind clouds and you become unsure of yourself, so you block the feelings out. You're afraid, afraid of getting hurt. How could he ever feel the same way for you? No, instead you seal the thoughts and help him find another girl, internally denying everything. But you're wrong, you're only hurting yourself. If you would just-"

A stinging slap! echoed around the vacant hall, ricocheting and threatening to shatter the windows. I found my eyes facing the wall, my head turned a full ninety degrees by the force of the girl's slender hand. The reaction of my foot falling back feels delayed, and the entire side of my face just started to smolder with fiery pain. I had never been hit by a girl before, in fact I've rarely physically fought at all. I brought a shaking hand up and tenderly touched my cheek, my flesh hot to the touch. My neck creaked as I pained myself to face the girl I provoked.

Her eyes had turned to pure liquid pools that threatened to spill over, darkened in shadow by the tilt of her head. I could see a hatred in them that stabbed at my core, but the emotion was not for me. She brought her flushed face down entirely, hiding from my gaze, her shoulders subtly shaking with silent sobs. I could only stare, stunned.

Well, good going, Hudson. You went and made a girl cry. You're a piece of work, you know that? Maybe this is why you shouldn't talk with people so much, because you're a complete jackass. Any more bright ideas? Why don't you go ahead and start poking fun at her hair? Perhaps by then someone will see this abominable scene and deduce your bullying and finally beat some sense into your faulty cranium.

My throat began to squeeze out an apology when Saionji suddenly bent down to sweep something off the floor. As I watched her, I realized I could barely make out what she had grabbed, it looked like a black blur. She stood back up, finally looking back at me while wiping at her large eyes, any trace of malice vanquished. A dainty hand stretched out to me, holding a pair of spectacles in its palm. Saionji had slapped the glasses off of my face and I hadn't even noticed. With a shaking hand, I gingerly plucked my eyesight from her.

"Saionji, I-I'm so sor-"

"No," she interrupted, a faint smile playing upon her lips. "You're absolutely right, I have been lying to myself."

I had to strain my ears to hear her now, her voice coming in a strangled whisper. "I really do lo- lo-"

"It's okay," I comforted, nesting a hand on her shoulder without thinking. "You don't have to tell me, you'll tell him in good time. We're gonna fix this little mess."

I tried my hardest to manage some kind of cool grin, despite the fact that my legs felt like bowls of pussing and my face still burned. Saionji looked up at me, her thin eyebrows crooked in a look of curiosity.

"I don't know how you know all this," she sighed, the redness in her face receding. "Maybe I am that obvious. But why are you helping me?"

I withdrew my hand, caught off guard by the question. Why indeed? Why did I feel it so vital that I aid these kids and save their lives? Was it just that, to be a hero? No, there was something else there, something that helped me to empathize with this girl's feelings. Something from my past.

"I just want to make sure you succeed where I failed," came my reply with an unfamiliar truthfulness.

Any further conversation would have to wait, as the bell signaling the end of lunch sliced through the halls. I gave her the smallest, sincerest smile I could muster, and she returned in kind. As we strolled down the corridor to class, dodging the crowds that spawned from nowhere, I breathed in deep, assuring myself that the hardest part was over with, getting the feisty one to cooperate. At least, I hope that was the hardest part.

By the last class of the day, I could barely keep my nose from crushing against my desk. Even in such a foreign atmosphere, school was school, boring and predictable. The day had been taxing on my energy, to say the least. I've partaken in more drama within the last few hours than perhaps my entire lifespan. Yet despite my mind's alarming need for rest, my thoughts still wandered ceaselessly. It dawned on me that I fought this fight alone. Sure, I may have won over an important piece to this game, but I felt uncertain about trusting her completely.

I needed someone who saw things the way I did, someone willing to risk more than any sane person should, just to make sure these kids avoided self destruction. Someone with a proclivity for harebrained plans that had no business succeeding as much as they did. Someone who could fight with a bit more bravado than myself when it came to what he cared for.

At the blare of the dismissal bell, I fought through a crowd of chatty students, failing to make a comfortable path for the exit. I popped out the doorway and into the bustling hall like a champagne cork. I began to panic, I had lost sight of Makoto, and I doubted I could remember the route back "home". Just when I thought I would have to begin the rude task of shoving, I spotted his familiar crop of black hair. But before I ran to catch up, my attention swapped to someone else. Someone whose glare burned holes in the back of Makoto's head from behind a pair of large, round spectacles.


	5. Evident Doubt

"Hey! You with the glasses, wait up!"

My pitiful yell fell on deaf ears, drowned out by the cacophony of the school's life. He still had an enormous head start on me, and I felt the distance grow with every second. I pumped more steam into my legs, willing myself to push beyond my untrained body's limits without breaking into a run. That would be too attention grabbing.

You may recall that I ran into this individual briefly before. During my restroom hunt. Yuuki, the boy with glasses at least three times the size of my own. He also had a respectable crush on Katsura. As I tailed him, I found myself confused as to why this kid bore into Makoto with the death glare. It's not like he and Katsura were a couple yet, and they never would be if I had any say in it.

This guy may be shorter than most girls, but he walked faster than a pyrophobic on a bed of coals. His stare followed Makoto all the way to the school's entrance before he broke off from the larger crowd of departing students on to a different path. I hesitated to follow, fearful that I may spend the night outdoors. The buildings and streets all appeared the same to me, getting back to where I started without aid sounded an unlikely feat. I made up my mind and pushed through the sea of skirts after the kid. Hmm. Maybe there did exist a significant difference in the male and female populations.

At some point, along what I observed to be some sort of shopping district, I heard a distinct set of giggles erupt from my six o'clock. I swiveled my head around to face the source, granting a shock to my pursuers with my jerky movement. I recognized the small group of girls from my bathroom incident, the girl with the ponytail in particular. Her face grew a shade darker at my abrupt halt.

"Eh, um," Otome stuttered, hoping for her friends to rescue her her. Instead, they continued to giggle and egged her forward. She sure seemed less confident than before, but I had no time for this.

"Can I help you?" I asked, trying my best not to sound too harsh while my patience ebbed away. I decided to save them the embarrassment of directly asking why they were following me.

"I'm Katou Otome. I-I was just wondering," she muttered with words so soft that I had to lean forward to hear her. "I mean, I heard that you were good at taking pictures."

Well that came as a surprise. She must have heard that from someone in my class. The smallest things sure did spread quickly, I had forgotten how gossipy schools could be.

"Ah, no," I laughed in a forceful manner. "Sure I like taking photographs, but I'm no good at it. It was sort of an amateur hobby of mine."

"Oh," Otome murmured, her disappointment unrestrained. I felt a shard of guilt for my lie now. "Well the school basketball team needs someone to take photos for the yearbook since the usual photographer moved away. You don't need to be that good, you can just come to our practice sessions and snap a few shots."

I peered at her with suspicious eyes. Surely they could afford to find someone more appropriately qualified for this. Isn't there a photography club?

"I'm not sure," I responded. "I don't even have a camera anymore-"

"I have one you can use!" Otome exclaimed out of nowhere, making me flinch. She realized right away that she had just yelled that and the pallor of her face transitioned from a light pink to a startling beat red. "S-sorry, I mean, you can borrow mine."

I nodded my head gradually, still unsettled by the outburst. "Sure, alright, I'll do it," I agreed. Her entire frame seemed to liquify as some of her pent up anxiety freed itself. Why on earth was she so nervous? I took this moment to take a glance behind myself. I nearly cried out loud when Yuuki was nowhere to be seen.

"I need to be somewhere," I informed them as I began taking quick hopping steps away from the group. "Just find me at school and let me know when you want me to take those pictures." Before any of their staring faces could respond, I spun on my heel and dashed clumsily away.

An alarm shrieked in my head, or was that just a car horn? Okay, think. How long did I talk with that girl? That conversation could not have lasted any more than a minute or two, but this kid was nowhere in sight. Shops lined the street for as far as I could see, no turns within a reasonable distance. With this busy traffic, I doubted he crossed the street so quickly. So that at least placed Yuuki in one of the shops on this side, and I had no intention of venturing into every single one. Instead, I opted to stay light on my feet while taking brief glances into the shop windows.

I ignored the startled eyes of the local pedestrians and focused on each figure concealed behind the many shopping displays. My eyes scanned unblinking. Clothing shops, convenience stores, shoe stores, tailors, bars, restaurants, none containing a boy as small as Yuuki. I actually found myself surprised at the amount of familiar uniforms, these kids flooded out here fast. And to think I rushed to get here.

One building managed to catch my eye with its out of place brick layout and bright windows. It looked like some sort of cafe, and entertained a healthy stream of couples. The door might as well have been propped open. Within the boundaries of this glowing little establishment, I could see mountains of sweets and baked goods contained behind a glass counter. A slice of cheesecake sure would hit the spot right about now, I thought before I slapped myself. Focus, idiot.

Well would you look at that, I'm not the only one with a sweet tooth. At the counter, having his order taken by a bouncy waitress with two large hair loops, stood fleet-footed Yuuki. The waitress left after a moment to retrieve his order. I guess now would be the ideal time to make introductions, but what was I going to say? Oh hey, would you like to join me in a convoluted plot to keep some kid from causing the murders of multiple individuals, including himself though he might as well deserve it? I sighed and pressed my forehead against the glass, fogging up my view. Perhaps I should once again play the role of the unknowing foreigner, I might even win myself a way home.

As I tried to brush by the flow of customers through the double doors, I wondered briefly about the center of the love triangle, Makoto. Sure, he may have shown some good in his brief life, but maybe he was just a bad person at heart? Would pairing him with the right girl early on really keep this guy from botching up other people's lives in the future? Forget it, if I think about all this too hard, I'll have to sign myself up to be committed. Let's just make sure that the key horror points of the story avoid execution.

The door's bells chimed as I scuttle insided, almost bumping into my target. After taking a deep breath and procrastinating a few unnecessary seconds, I gave the shorter boy a few taps on the shoulder. He swiftly spun around, his small, surprised face engulfed by his glasses. They were even bigger up close.

"Yes?" came his soft voice, ladled with suspicion.

"Oh, um, I couldn't help but notice your uniform," I spouted lamely, attempting to cover up the fact that I already knew who he was. "You're from Sakakino, right?"

"Of course," he smiled, glancing at our matching blazers. At least he seemed openly friendly.

"My name is Hudson Rupert," I bowed a tad, still not knowing exactly how introductions went around here. "I'm a transfer student, so I'm new to the area and I've been trying to make friends on my first day."

He returned the bow, whether or not to humor me I did not know. "Ashikaga Yuuki," he replied. "It's always good to make friends in unfamiliar lands. So what brings you to this cafe? The food is good but," he leaned in close and whispered, "The service here kinda sucks."

"I heard that!" howled the loopy haired waitress who had materialized back at the counter with a small box. Those maid uniforms sure were something when you saw them in person. "Maybe I should ruin this cake so your sister kills you."

Yuuki spun around and began making his excuses with flailing hands. The girl simply refused to listen, replying only with a pout. She shoved the take-out box into his arms, then her eyes hooked onto mine, causing a tiny falter in my stance.

"Who's your friend," she asked in a loud manner, clearly not caring if I heard. She evaluated me from top to bottom.

"Geez, Kuroda," he groaned, still fishing money from his pockets. "This is Hudson Rupert, he's a transfer student."

At this she sent an enthusiastic wave in my direction and exposed a toothy grin. I raised a weak hand back and smiled back, giving off a more reserved aura than I would prefer. Being caught off guard had always seized up my cognitive abilities

"Hello," I replied, going the route of brief conversation. All these faces to keep track of, and I'm terrible with names. To my great fortune, Yuuki shared my longing to leave the busy little cafe. He began to lead me away from the talkative girl.

"I go to Sakakino too," she called as I was almost forcibly pushed toward the exit by the smaller boy. "Don't be shy if you see me in school!"

"Well, thanks for that," I laughed when we stopped out on the sidewalk. "I feel I've hit my quota for new acquaintances for today."

"I can imagine," He smiled back, swinging the small box in his hand as he walked. "I guess none of them take the same route as you home?"

"Ah, actually I did make friends with someone that lives near my house, but I managed to lose track of them after school."

Yuuki raised an eyebrow at my dilemma and slowed his gait. "So you're lost?" I rocked a pathetic nod in response. After admitting my inability to read and find my way home, he humbly insisted accompanying me until I remembered. We spun a quick one-eighty and trundled back in the direction of the school, with the hope of me recognizing my way back from there. I held only a smidgen of confidence, though without the distraction of hunting a character down, maybe my subconscious would pick back up and lead me home.

"Geez," he sighed. "Who's the friend that went and left you behind?"

"Oh I'm sure he didn't mean to," I responded in an understanding manner. "His name is Makoto Itou, we're in the same class."

At the mention of the dark haired boy, Yuuki's face changed dramatically. His eyebrows furrowed in obvious anger and his pupils dilated. Had I not noticed his sudden silence at my side, I would not have seen his expression before it dissipated and morphed into something that lacked emotion.

"You should stay away from that guy," Yuuki stated in a blank and eerie voice. I knew this kid would end up hating Makoto, but so soon? The romances hadn't even started up yet, had they?

"Why do you say that?" I chuckled falsely, trying to ignore his change in mood. "Is he some kind of delinquent?"

"I've just seen him do things, things that aren't right."

Ominous. "Care to elaborate?" I poked. "You don't have to worry about it getting out from me, I never tell about these sorts of things."

He paused for a minute, looking into my eyes as if to read my mind and decipher whether I spoke the truth. His amber eyes darted around me from behind his enormous glasses. For a second, I wondered what potential secrets those spectacles could hold. Built in x-ray? I shouldered my comical imagination and remembered that this was serious.

"Okay," he finally breathed. "I guess it would be nice to have someone I can trust."

So throughout the course of our walk, he relayed to me his story as one of the school's librarians, today being one of his days off. Katsura apparently visited the library nearly every day, checking out a book or two with every visit. Many were romance novels, but that mattered not. Young Yuuki here developed quite a crush on the fair girl.

Of course he didn't say this to my face, but with his flushed skin and onset of stammering, one hardly needed to be a criminal mastermind to put that together. His discontent with Makoto stemmed from overhearing a conversation between Saionji and Katsura. Katsura had admitted to Saionji that she liked Makoto.

"Sounds like a bit of jealousy," I smirked.

"I-I'm not jealous!" he blurted with a lack of conviction. "Besides, that's not all. I've heard from his classmates that he is going out with Saionji. But earlier today I found out that during lunch, Makoto confessed to Katsura and she accepted."

I nearly tumbled over my own feet at this, my arms wobbling comically to keep my balance. This couldn't be true. No... Damn! This threw a nice pile of wrenches into my plans. As if I didn't have a hard enough time figuring this all out when Katsura wasn't attached to him, but now I risk the possibility of her insanity should I try to pull them apart. Things were not looking good for Saionji, or my mentality for that matter.

"I know right?" Yuuki acknowledged, misunderstanding my stumble. "This guy is a two timing jerk."

"It's not just that," I groaned, rubbing my temples together to repel the oncoming migraine. "That whole thing on the rooftop, I didn't know that happened."

"Rooftop?" Yuuki said quizzically. "What are you talking about?"

The sky had taken on a calming blend of orange and pink, the sun faltering from its perch. I couldn't believe how late it was. We were back at the school now, surrounded by a plethora of paths that seemed to spiral in every direction. Then, before my hope evaporated I recalled seeing a bakery on our way to school. The memory jogged the image into my mind and pointing out the street came easily. I motioned for Yuuki to follow while I explained my situation, taking care to leave out certain bits.

"Earlier today, we all had lunch together on the rooftop; me, Makoto, Saionji, and Katsura. On a side note, never eat a sandwich made by Katsura," I pointed, wearing the expression of a man who had brushed with death. "Anyway, Saionji dragged me out of there after a while to give the other two some privacy under the guise of showing me around the school. Makoto and Saionji are not a couple, but she eventually told me that she wishes they were despite the fact that she tried to help Makoto with Katsura. I then vowed to make her wish happen, without the knowledge that Makoto would confess while we were away."

I took a quick breath and shrugged my shoulders, "So that about sums up my little conundrum."

Yuuki walked silently for while, the scrunched look on his face telling me that the sudden onslaught of information proved difficult to process. His glasses misted and his brow twitched, and his hand kept rummaging through his mess of chocolate hair. I feared that the silence would grow awkward before he finally said something.

"That is a problem," he answered, telling me what I already knew. "How would you have gotten Makoto to focus on Saionji if he likes Katsura?"

Good, he knew to ask the right questions.

"I tested whether he had feelings for her by bringing up the idea of me asking her out," I replied. "He was clearly jealous of the thought, and the two are nearly inseparable. He's a romantic mess, so I honestly don't trust him with Katsura." I decided to leave out the part where I actually convinced Makoto that I was Saionji's boyfriend. So many lies... So much potential for backfire.

Yuuki nodded with more enthusiasm than necessary. "I see. This jerk is sounding worse every minute. You know what, I think we should work together on this. He could end up hurting these girls."

"Mmm," I nodded sagely, the envy of every knowledgeable sensei. "I'm sure that's your reason. I guess I would need someone to make Katsura happy as well."

"Th-that's not-"

"It's all fine, Yuuki," I cut him off, holding up my hands in defense. "I understand completely. I'm a professional on human psychology."

"Why do I doubt that," he squinted, turning up a skeptic nose. We both popped with a series of snickers, which slowly grew when we heard each other. It was several minutes before we settled down. I closed my eyes to wipe away the joyful tears and then opened them to the familiar view of my station.

Yuuki assisted me in purchasing my ticket this time, instilling me with a wave of relief and gratitude. According to the schedule, which my new ally read for me, the next train would be arriving in five minutes. I thanked him for coming so far out of his way to help.

"Yeah, well, it all turned out to be very informative," he beamed reaching out a hand in a manner that surprised me. I sent him a smug grin and firmly clasped his hand, happy to accept the familiar gesture of friendship. "I'll see you tomorrow at school then, Rupert."

"You'll be in the library, I take it?" I asked, releasing his hand. "You know, you could just meet up with us at lunch. Get you more familiar with how these kids act."

"I'll see what I can do about that, but I don't really want to deal with that guy in person," he grunted with a face like he had inhaled a foul smell. "Oh, do you have a cell phone so I can give you my number?"

I gave him an apologetic look. "Actually I-"

Cutting me off was a muffled chime vibrating from the depths of my backpack. It took me a second to realize that the sound was mine. I pulled the pack off and dug into it, bringing forth a loud little cell phone that I had no idea I had. I flipped the blue device open and kissed it with my ear.

"Hello?" I greeted slowly.

"Rupert," came a stern voice I recognized as my mother's, or rather my pretend mother's. "You weren't home when I left for work. What's taking you so long?"

"Sorry, I got caught up making new friends."

Her released breath came through in a flurry of static, like leaves against a cheese grater. "Well, I'm glad you're making friends. Just don't worry me so much. At least call me if you're going to be home late."

"Got it, you don't have to tell me twice."

I ended the crisp conversation with a clack and looked back to Yuuki. I held the small phone out to him.

"Do you think you could swap our numbers for me?" He nodded with understanding. I really needed to get some kind of basic reading abilities under my belt.

We said our friendly goodbyes after he handed me back my phone. When he walked off into the night, I only stood alone on the platform for a minute longer before the rails began to shudder audibly. My long awaited carriage squealed to a stop before me. It's sliding doors parted, bathing my solitary frame with the otherworldly glow spilling out from within. My dress shoes clacked through the still, dusk air as I ventured forth into the blinding void.

Under the mask of night, the street took infinitely longer to map out than I would have liked. The street lamps did little to help my untrained eyes differentiate between the plethora of blocky buildings. Panic nearly paralyzed me as I began to wonder if I had come to the wrong station. It took me nearly an hour before I braved the door of one of the hundreds of identical houses. When I had left that morning, I barely spared the building a passing glance. This time, I took note of the number '221' hanging next to the entrance.

Upon entering, I immediately recognized the furnishings from within, dispelling my crippling anxiety. I made a bee line for my room, ignoring the lack of life within the home. I tore off as much of my clothing that would come off without much hassle, and promptly collapsed in a heap on the bed. My brain had finally decided to give up for the day, a wise choice that my body applauded. But a pang of guilt still gnawed at my insides. Is this the proper path to take? Sticking my nose into other people's relationships? I tried to justify this by believing that I would save lives, but was I really? Many events had already unfolded differently than I remember, maybe there was no danger.

I filled my lungs deeply and locked the feelings away. They were animated characters, they should be happy I care so much. The last thought that echoed through my mind before it powered down was, to my displeasure, how on earth a beauty such as Katsura could put together a sandwich so horrid that it deemed hazardous enough to warrant for a quarantine.


	6. In A Nightmare Within A Nightmare

How did I to get myself into this mess?

Besides the panicked clamor of my shoes, the halls of the school were silent and unsettling. Barely visible classroom doors sailed by in a blur and the lack of light felt suffocating. My pursuer would surely hear my noisy footsteps and my heavy breathing. The thought unleashed a flood of perilous feelings that yanked at my stomach. I could feel the adrenaline stretch my veins, throwing my limbs into locomotion. I would not let it end like this, not after accomplishing so much.

I slid a few feet as I came to a sharp turn and scurried back into motion like a bat out of hell. The wall on my left was now lined with broad windows, revealing the eerie night sky. No stars, only the cloudy moon. Just a blanket of darkness. The distant silhouettes of trees stood still in the stagnant air. A small laugh licked at my ears, the laughter of death. It shocked the hairs on my neck into stiff rigor mortis, and I pushed reserved energy into my weak legs. No.. NO! Get away! I will not die like this.

I was careless. An ear wrenching crack split the night air as I landed on one of my ankles at a bad angle. My body hit the tiles in a muffled crumple, and slid a few feet before hitting the end of the hall. The skittering clack of my broken glasses scraping along the floor sank my heart further. I sat up and tried to drag myself along the blurry wall in a futile attempt to keep going, but something stopped me.

An unyielding force snagged firmly on my slacks, holding me in place no matter how hard I scratched at the floor. I turned over and looked into the faded eyes of my assailant, ghastly orbs implanted in a face of ghostly skin. They were wide and piercing, sending a shiver down my spine with their unrestrained insanity. Dead eyes.

I could see my reflection in the shimmer of a silver blade, the image of a pathetic and broken boy, a corpse. My throat swelled and felt like cotton, paralyzed. I could not scream. The blade drew up, pointed now at my chest. My body could not muster the courage to respond to my brain's pleading, begging my arms to work. I could not move. I watched as the sharp steel's ascent came to a brief stop, and sailed into my heart.

A jolt like lightning threw me into the air, stretching my eyelids apart and bending my abdomen. I sat up in my bed, wide awake and soaked in sweat. My breathing was loud and heavy, as though I had just surged through a marathon. I clenched at my chest and tried to settle my heart. It threatened to burst forth from its frame.

It took several minutes in a cold shower to finally bring my panicked heartbeat back into my control. What a nightmare, whatever it was about. Only brief flashes of it remained in my memory. Something to do with the school and the fear of eminent doom. No surprise there considering my situation. My situation... I guess I truly am in this world to stay. Would I ever see my home again?

I stared out the window in my room, wrapped in a beige towel. The smallest pink strokes in the sky told of the sun's awakening. The alarm clock on my nightstand read '6:24'. I shut off the alarm that would ring within the hour.

The same sounds from yesterday morning repeated and breached the walls of my room. I threw on a clean uniform from the closet and headed to the kitchen with hope for a hearty breakfast. I found it unique just how quickly I adapted to this new environment. The woman in the kitchen looked up from her cooking to hand me a scowl and point at the food on the small table.

"You didn't bring back your lunch box," she chastised as I took a seat. "We don't have any others, so unless you want to keep your food in your backpack without a container, you'll have to eat the school's lunch for today."

"Sorry, Mom," I sighed. "I must've forgotten it in the classroom. I'll bring it back after school today." Of course, I knew I had left it on the school roof. Those gruesome sandwiches really took me for a loop. I looked down at the plate of food set before me. My eyebrows flew up.

Eggs with toast and bacon. How bizarre, but then again I guess my mother in this world is also from the U.S. I cared little at the moment. With a fork as my weapon of choice, I began the unceremonious task of shoveling food down my gullet. My appetite roared, I hadn't eaten anything yesterday except a bite of Katsura's homemade lunch, which I promptly spat out. My mother said something about chewing my food properly, but I could barely hear her over the meal rushing into my system.

My leave this morning was less than eventful in comparison to the previous day. I closed the front door and took in the cool morning air, fresh with car exhaust. It was more fresh than AC quality at least. I guess. As I hefted my backpack and strode along the lonely sidewalk, I noticed a noisy couple up ahead. It looked like a large guy hitting on a girl, his arm against a building with the girl leaning on the wall. Flirting this early in the day? Kids these days I swear...

The figures were brought into better focus as I tread closer. I immediately recognized the girl as Katsura, and knew right away that whatever this guy was doing, it was against her will. I cemented my feet in place, unsure of what to do. He was a decently sized guy, at least a couple hundred pounds. He wore some kind of black biker jacket, like a greaser or some other stereotypical street rat. I could hear Katsura's stuttering from where I stood. My blood began to boil and sear my skin.

Fight or flight. I could just skip cross the street, ignore everything, turn a blind eye. My lungs inhaled a deep breath and I wiped my glasses clean. No. I swallowed my cowardly intentions. If I just let this guy carry on, my conscience would never let it go. Too many of these dirtbags got away with this sort of crime. Plus, he could be causing her to grow unstable. I stood for another moment, then marched forth with a backbone that I had no right to own.

I was about ten feet away when Katsura's violet eyes locked onto mine, pleading for my help. For being a potential murderer, she sure carried a strong sense of defenselessness. The scruffy man taking advantage of this cut off his sentence and traced her gaze to my face. His black hair wound up into the air in a comical fashion, forcing me to hold back a laugh. Fear sure had a way of making things seem funnier than usual. I prodded at the bulge of my cell phone in my pocket.

"What are you looking at, four eyes?" he grunted with a sneer. Openly hostile with a primitive insult. Alright, great.

"I'd get out of here, guy," I threatened, scowling with a false sense of bravado. "I don't think she wants an unhygienic troll such as yourself invading her personal space."

"Ooooh, that's some mouth you got there, kiddo," he grinned with crooked and yellowed teeth. "Me and the lady here are just getting to know each other, you should skip off to your preschool before you get hurt."

Preschool? How absurd, I looked older than Katsura. Right? "Fair enough," I yawned, imitating impatience. "I just hope the lady agrees with your story when the police get here."

The bent nose on this guys face twitched and his lip pulled up in an ugly grimace. "You think I don't know when some punk is bluffing?," he spat, his body language betraying his confidence.

"Do you really want to take that chance?" I frowned thoughtfully, reaching into my pocket and pulling out my cell phone. "I called them on the way over. Are years of your life in jail for sexually harassing a minor really worth it, as opposed to just going on your way?"

"Dammit," he cursed, eyeing my phone with a sudden urgency. "They'd put me away forever this time." He tossed a few grumbles and then backed away jerkily before spinning and running down an alley.

I held my steely gaze until he was out of sight before I released a ragged breath like a hot air balloon. My bones wobbled in their sockets, but I held strong. I looked to Katsura, and dashed to her side, placing a comforting hand on her shoulder.

"A-are you alright, Katsura?" I asked with concern decorating my face. I searched her body with flashing eyes for any signs of bodily injury. "He didn't hurt you did he?"

"No," came her quiet reply. She looked fine enough, just a little flustered. I've never been in a situation like this before, a reoccurring theme in this world apparently. She still seemed uncomfortable. I looked at my hand and retracted it in a heartbeat.

"Sorry," I gasped. "I'm just relieved that went way better than it could've. I never actually did call the police." I really didn't want to deal with the local authorities, I don't even know what the emergency number for Japan is.

She looked up at me, a whisper of a smile curved her lips and I felt a reassuring wave of ease wash over me. Katsura would be fine, and I had just managed to scare off an ogre twice my bulk. I should get some kind of hero of the city award. Okay, ego, calm down.

"Would you, um, like to walk together?" she blushed, eyes bouncing about away from my direction. What is with all these girls being so timid? Did I just have some kind of intimidating aura about my person?

"Oh, sure, I mean I guess there isn't much choice," I laughed as I sent an awkward hand to the back of my head and rummaged through my hair. I needed a trim. Did anime hair grow?

Katsura responded with a gentle nod and we set off for the train station, side by side. The walk was silent, but not at all embarassing. The atmosphere actually held a refreshing calm between the two of us, not a word needed to be said.

When we boarded the station platform, Makoto was there to greet us with a wave. Katsura looked back at me with another smile and a quiet "Thank you" as she walked over to the boy's side. He was obviously surprised by my presence. I wondered if my fabricated status as Saionji's boyfriend still nagged at him.

"Ah, Rupert, I didn't know you lived in the same area as Katsura," he said with innocent curiosity.

"Yeah, I actually ran into her yesterday," I admitted. "I didn't know her at the time of course, and we didn't exactly have the most pleasant of run-ins."

I ventured a glance at Katsura and she merely blushed, but strangely held on to her smile. She embodied every appealing aspect of a porcelain doll, but every time my thoughts strayed to the cuteness of any of these girls, an image of a crimson stained blade flashed through my memory. Never let your guard down, these kids were capable of painful atrocities, no matter how innocent they may look.

But still, she was undeniably cute. Right? Could a being made up of a multitude of still drawings be considered attractive? They weren't real. The scientist in me briefly took over. I lost myself in the questioning corridors of my mind again, unknowingly reaching a finger forward. A soft, fleshy barrier enveloped and stopped further advancement, and Makoto flinched. He rubbed his cheek with a look that made me want to break down into hysterics.

"What was that for?" he asked with a voice of concern.

"Sorry, Makoto. I was just testing a theory," I replied with a cheesy grin. "I've been finding myself lost in thought more and more these days."

Unfortunately, it was just as I predicted. The people in this surreal world felt as real as any flesh and blood individual back home. Maybe it would have been best for me to have left the topic alone. Now it would be harder to disconnect myself from them as being only fictional characters.

The route to school floated by without much conversation. At one point, Makoto said something about a festival of some kind, but my thoughts were elsewhere. Katsura responded to him in her quiet, airy voice while he went on loudly. I'm sure these two would rather bond than have me butt in. I still needed to think of a plan to separate them.

When we entered our home room, Saionji acted every bit the same as she did the previous morning. Not a hint of our talk from yesterday played upon her attitude. If I were to hold true to my word and help her with Makoto, we would have to talk sooner or later, but right now she seemed more preoccupied with teasing the boy. Our discussion would have to be in private anyways. I hoped she had ideas.

Classes sped by at the rate of your average slug, if that slug were hampered by a treadmill. It was no use. Eventually my head hit the desk so hard that the clang of the impact woke me right back up. Snickers erupted around the room and the teacher fixed me with a bored look. He must have thought my action to be a jab at his lecture. The bell of lunch's arrival sang like a chorus of angels, tuned by the hands of beauty itself.

A flurry of students later, and I found myself out in the hall, fighting the tides of uniforms. I needed to get to the roof and retrieve my lunch box before I forgot. Afterward I'll scope out the cafeteria and judge its delicacies. My navigational skills had finally proven reliable after I found the stairs to the roof. I skipped to the top and barged through the door, eager to get back and eat.

The sun shined its universal greeting, a friendly sight from something I had always deemed an enemy. I never liked hot climates, and I preferred the night, but for the moment the sun graced me as the only thing that had followed me from home.

The rooftop was nice when a group of loud and unpredictable kids didn't crowd it. A comforting breeze mixed with the refreshing air and cleaned my suit of the building's artificial coolness. It tousled my hair like a father playfully greeting his son. Would those kids come up here often? Maybe I could have lunch on the roof in peace and think properly for once.

I could see my lunch box from where I stood, a lonely object forgotten on the ground beside a bench. Katsura's meal completely destroyed my appetite at the time. No doubt its untouched contents would spell an unholy sight after braving the elements for a whole twenty-four hours. I had reached down for the box when the creak of the roof access caught my ears. My body spun around and I feared the authority of a faculty member and the thought of detention. Haha, of all the nonsense going on, detention was probably the least of my worries.

"Rupert?" came Saionji's curious tone. She walked out from the shadow of the doorway, one hand clutching a lunch container while the other braced her hair against the wind.

"Oh, uh, hey Saionji," I replied, my dreams of eating here peacefully withering away. "I was just getting my lunch box, I completely forgot it yesterday." I snatched the box up, brushing away the thought of peeking inside.

"Heh, I was wondering why you came this way," she laughed feebly. "So about yesterday..."

The last dregs of hope I had for a quiet moment died in the pit of my stomach. I looked around her figure to the darkened doorway, anticipating other arrivals.

"Don't worry," Saionji assured, noticing my gaze. "Makoto decided to eat lunch with Kotonoha in the classroom. It'll just be you and me up here." Her tone only sank by the tiniest decibel, but nothing escaped my keen senses. I tried my best to conjure up a comforting smile.

"Sure, let me just get something from the cafeteria, I'm starving."

"You don't have to eat that slop," she chortled with genuine amusement this time. "I brought some extra food for you as thanks for, you know. Deciding to help me."

"Well, I don't know," I said with crossed arms, cogitating on the thought. "I've been having pretty bad luck with other people's homemade lunches lately."

"Pshh, don't worry about it. I pride myself in being a decent chef when I need to be," she gleamed with a toothy grin. People around here sure loved showing off what they could do with food. Maybe this time around would prove less detrimental to my health.

"Alright," I gave in. How could I deny free food that someone put time into? "Let's see if you kill me or not."

As it turned out, her cooking skills surpassed Katsura's level by far, though that said little. Nonetheless, it tasted fair, albeit a bit unusual compared to what I'm used to. There were these little cubes of egg, some rice balls, and other stuff that I payed little attention to before it disappeared into my mouth. Usually my composure would remain unbroken in the presence of others, but I felt myself slowly becoming relaxed around these people. Maybe all my worrying was canceling out my self-consciousness.

"You're cooking is amazing, Saionji," I managed to mumble through a mouthful. My manners had dissipated with the wind.

I could tell my compliment struck a delicate cord by the way her entire face froze in a grateful expression, smudges of red painting under her eyes. "Thanks, but don't talk with food in your mouth, dummy," she huffed as she watched gleefully. "And call me Sekai."

I looked to her with bulging cheeks for a second before bobbing my head in compliance. I had honestly forgotten about the whole first and last name stuff.

"So," the girl said as I continued to stuff my face. "When you said you wanted me to succeed where you failed, what did you mean by that?"

I turned to her with inflated cheeks like a hamster, unprepared for such a question. With a painful effort, I swallowed the mouthful and let out a thoughtful breath. Did I really say that? I'd call anyone uttering a line like that a complete drama queen.

"You could say I've been in your position," I replied after a moment of thought. "I went through the painful process of having feelings for someone without ever knowing if they shared the same. Hardly likely in my case, though I never found out. Since we're friends, it would pain me to see the same happen to you. The world doesn't need more people like me. We are friends, right?"

She stared in a mix of slight surprise and confusion. Did I give out too much personal information on my love life? Perhaps, but I needed to tell a believable story so she would trust me, and the truth often was.

"Y-yeah, of course we're friends," she chimed with a reddened face. "This would be difficult to do otherwise. So what are we going to do?"

So impatient. Must she be so lively and unrelenting?

"Hmm. I've been trying to come up with some kind of plan," I said, rubbing at my temples. "But I haven't thought of anything worthwhile. I have another friend who's also helping me out. He kind of has a crush on Katsura."

"You're dragging more people into this?" she laughed, velvety hair bouncing with each breath. "You really are making friends fast."

"I don't know what it is about this place," I marveled as I adjusted my glasses. "It somehow managed to hatch my inner social butterfly I guess."

Sekai found further joy in my self revelation. "So what about you? You're acting as this grand matchmaker but don't you want to find a girlfriend or something?"

"Uh, you've seen me right?" I asked, quirking an eyebrow and pointing at my squarish glasses. "Even if I wanted to go through the trouble, I'm not exactly Prince Charming. I have a pretty bad effect on girls, as you've experienced. And I've been wondering, am I intimidating or something?"

"You're not so bad and no, you're far from intimidating," she comforted, which had the opposite effect on me. "I mean yeah, you're an idiot, but you're also kind. You're really not that bad looking either..."

"It's fine," I said abruptly, my eyes wide. We both resembled cherries in our complexion. "I appreciate it, but for now, let's just focus on helping you, alright?"

We spent the rest of lunch tossing silly ideas at each other, none generating much hope between us. Makoto and Kotonoha were already going out, which was already beyond most hope. Only I knew that. Detaching Makoto would take little effort, as many know, but Kotonoha's oddly resilient loyalty would present the real obstacle. Catching Makoto as a cheater would just send her over the edge mentally, she would never fault him. I needed to figure out how to work Kotonoha into breaking her attraction from him, but just what did she see in the guy? It's like trying to get a robin to stop loving the air.

"Maybe we'll just have to tackle them individually," I groaned as we began packing up to return to class. "I need to talk with Makoto about something first, but you should invite him to hangout after school. You shouldn't have too much trouble convincing him, I already know he likes you. It's Katsura I'm worried about. We can't just have him break up with her..."

My reveal of Makoto's feelings came as an obvious surprise to Saionji, who wore a face of bewilderment. "What do you mean you already know he likes me?"

I averted my gaze from her. Oh well, I might as well tell her before Makoto says something about it. "I sort of convinced him that you and I were going out, to gauge how he felt about you. As I predicted, he responded with tangible jealousy. So yes, you can rest assured knowing that he does return your feelings."

She blinked in astonishment. "You told him we were going out? Like, as a couple?"

"Er, yes," I muttered uneasily. "That's not too much of a problem, is it? I plan on hinting to him that you're not really into the relationship and that he should be the one with you."

"O-oh," she stammered, trying to avoid my analytical view.

"Are you alright?" I asked. She seemed to be holding something back, but I had no clue what.

"It's nothing, really," the girl chimed with a sudden cheerfulness. "It just makes me happy that you're doing so much to help me."

"I'm helping both of you," I reminded with a pointing finger. "As well as Katsura."

"Mmm," she hummed absently as she picked up her bento box. "Ah, we should keep in contact, let me see your phone. Makoto told me how you can't read and that you'll need help with your homework."

I handed her my phone with an embarrassed grimace. "Heh, yes well, I don't think homework will be such a problem for the time being."

Her slender fingers danced upon the keys of my cell phone for only a few seconds before she was finished. I was never that quick even with my old cell phone.

"There," she winked, holding the device out. "I also went ahead and put in Makoto's and Kotonoha's numbers. They shouldn't mind, though I would let Kotonoha know beforehand so she isn't caught too off guard by your nonsense. But really, you should let me help you with your homework. It would be terrible if my personal cupid flunked out."

"Thanks," I grunted, a little put off by the idea of doing homework. Never cared for the stuff, and I haven't even glanced at the assignments. There weren't many, mercifully. Did she call me cupid? "I'll get back to you on the homework thing when my mind isn't preoccupied."

"Remember," I whispered into the girl's ear as we approached the entrance of our classroom. Clusters of students hurdled by, desperate to make it to class on time. "Make plans with him as soon as possible as often as possible."

Sekai looked at me and I detected a brief note of apprehension in her expression before it changed to confidence. She responded with a curt nod and entered the room. I followed after, still wondering why she continued to hesitate so frequently. Was she still unsure whether to trust me or not? Whatever, as long as she remained as in love with Makoto as she was in the show, her part should be easy.

"Hello, Katsura."

The elegant girl perched at one of the many large tables the quiet library had to offer. She pulled her small nose from the depths of a thick book, peering through a pair of reading glasses I had no idea she owned.

When classes had ended, Makoto evaporated into the crowded halls before I could catch him so I came to the library to talk with Yuuki, but he had asked me to wait while he finished up his library duties. Then I found Kotonoha.

"Oh, hello, Hudson," replied her tiny voice. "What are you doing here?"

"I could ask you the same thing," I teased. "Shouldn't you be out on a date with Makoto?"

A bright rose blossomed and colored her fair face. "N-no, we only just became a couple, so we're taking it slow. I'm usually here every day after school. Do you read a lot?"

"Well, I did back home," I admitted with a nostalgic fondness. "It was one of the few things I spent most of my time doing. Of course, I can't read anything here."

"Oh, that's so sad," she said with soft sympathy. "This library has a lot of good novels you would probably like."

"I wouldn't doubt it, I read just about every genre," I smirked. "Do you mind if I sit here?"

She shook her head lightly, and I helped myself to a seat.

"I'm just here to wait for another friend, so don't let me interrupt your reading."

And with that, she beamed with closed eyes and delved back into the pages of her novel. From the cover, it looked like some kind of romance story, with a boy and a girl standing side by side entwined in a tangle of hearts. Hmm, those stories would probably be the rare exception to my list of reading material.

"Um, Hudson?"

"Hmm?"

Kotonoha was looking up at me from her book again, and I noticed that the blush on her cheeks had yet to take its leave. Was it hot in here?

"W-would you like to walk home together?"

This girl was just full of surprises. "Sure, if you can stand my company. I'm also still getting used to the train system, so a friend is welcome with open arms."

She nodded with a timid smile and returned to her book. The minutes began to stretch as I waited. The library remained still, with the exception of the scratching of turning pages and murmurs from talkative students. The ticking drone of a clock played a hypnotizing beat on the air. Before I knew it, fatigue took the reigns once again, and I closed my heavy eyelids.

"Hudson?"

I jerked my head off the library table at the sound of my name. The cool surface of this wooden table proved to be an inviting place to rest my eyes. That was until this interruption.

"Yes?" I called wearily, sliding in my seat to face my disturber. In the edge of my peripheral, I could see Kotonoha shifting uneasily. Tawny hair, slim athletic build, and a bouncy ponytail. Yep, I found myself in the company of Katou Otome once again. Instead of the usual uniform, she wore the t-shirt and dark shorts of a P.E. outfit. She still looked uneasy, but she seemed to have improved since our last encounter. I noticed her posse was absent.

"Do you think now would be an alright time to take those photos?" she asked innocently. Damn, I had completely forgotten. This is what I get for agreeing to things without thinking.

"Oh, um, does it have to be now?" I questioned softly, stealing a glance at Kotonoha. She remained glued to her book, but her face seemed worried.

Otome's eyes shifted and she wore a delicate frown that immediately had a guilt-inducing effect on me. Her nervous atmosphere had returned in full force, spreading to me like a cold. Her ponytail bobbed with the tiny nod of her head. Well, I did tell her to just find me at school whenever, so this is the price I pay for careless words.

"If you insist," I said as I creaked up from my seat. "I'll be back in a bit, Katsura."

Otome sent the silent bookworm an intense look that I could not decipher and, without another word, turned and strode for the exit with the gait of a girl on a mission. I assumed I should follow, so I did. I noticed that Yuuki was no longer at the front desk when we walked by. I dug out my phone to text him when a horrific realization occurred to me. I can't read these texts. How had that not hit me over the head before?

Just when I began to panic, the subject of my stress began to vibrate in my hand. After a hesitant moment, I flipped it open. My attention focused on the miniature image of a flashing envelope in the corner of the screen, which I believed meant I had a text message. I pushed down on a button that I hoped would open the text up and almost cried aloud at what greeted me.


	7. Dexterous Sport and Camellia Sinensis

I stared down into the luminescent screen of my phone, and read the presented message. That's right, I could read it. For a second, I thought my head was putting words there for me or that knowledge of the written language had somehow unlocked itself within my conscious. When I focused closer, I deciphered the truth to be much less complicated.

The wording of the message did indeed consist of the Latin letters of the English language, but the sentence structure made little sense without some thought. It looked as though the text had been ground through a rough translator, and that's where I drew my conclusion; my phone was equipped with a simple translator. I wish I had given the thing a more thorough look over.

Sekai's name graced the top of the message. It explained that she and Makoto had gone to the shopping district, but he was "acting like an idiot and not paying any attention to me. He says he's not sure how to grow closer to Kotonoha." She also added that she wanted to discuss more of the overall plan with me tomorrow. Same time on the roof.

I read the wording over and over, assuring myself that I understood the mixed message until the bright screen burned a glowing rectangle into my vision. Lunch on the roof with just the two of us? Again? When would I get to eat in peace? I'm supposed to be conspiring a plan with Yuuki, but he's proving to be difficult to catch a time slot with. I began typing in my response:

**If only you had refrained from aiding their relationship in the first place. I do usually prefer to eat in privacy, but no matter. We'll figure something out eventually. Lunch on the roof is fine, but only if you bring more of your cooking.**

It took me a few seconds to find the translate function on my phone. After a moment, the English lettering blinked into the crisscrossing lines and dashes of Japanese characters. I knew right away that the message would be just as ridiculous sounding as her's had been to me. The thought prompted me to add another line:

**Please excuse my phone's crude translation.**

I sent the message on its way, hoping that we truly could figure something out, but my doubts lingered. If the future began to look bleak, I would have to try to convince Sekai to leave the couple alone, but I knew that would never happen. Makoto would end up becoming too impatient with Kotonoha, just as he had before, and then turn to Sekai for his hormonal relief. The barbarian would have little trouble convincing her.

"We're here."

I nearly smacked into Otome's small back, my attention set upon my mobile phone. Without my notice, we had managed to wander into the school's large and vacant gymnasium. It had steely gray bleachers on each side of a standard basketball court, and it wafted a vague scent of sweat and rubber, but stood without a single body to greet us. As far as I could tell, we were its only current inhabitants. I took note of a large duffel bag set upon the last row of one of the bleachers.

"So," I started as my glasses scanned the gym. "Where's the rest of your team, Katou?"

"They're not here,"she mumbled quietly before she stole a secretive glance. I raised my brow in a look of befuddlement.

"So we're early?"

I had a good enough idea that this would not be the case, and she did little to hide her tells. Her dainty hands twisted at the ends of her shirt and she bit her lip. "No, they're not coming today. It's just going to be me."

I raised my head and gazed at her from under my glasses. Her voice came out with a confidence that ran opposite to her appearance. She was more fidgety than a caffeinated college student in a four hour class. I decided that maybe she just didn't want to admit that she desired more photos of herself in the yearbook as opposed to her teammates. That would explain why she steered away from any of the school's actual photographers. Someone familiar with the school's routine would require the entire team to be here.

"I guess if you really are fine with me doing this," I shrugged, trying to sound as nonchalant as possible. "Lead me to the camera."

The gym echoed with her footsteps as she walked over to the duffel bag and uncovered a dense looking camera. It looked more sophisticated than any camera I had ever dealt with, and I was overcome with an unfamiliar sense of technological intimidation. She held the bulky device out to me with a mischievous curl of her lips. My hands clenched a death grip upon it, fearful of paying for damage costs.

"Are you sure it's okay for me to handle this thing?" I asked with a hint of uncertainty. I turned the camera over and eyed the many switches and dials. "It looks kind of expensive."

"It's okay," she giggled, bringing ease back into her unsettled mood. "It was a gift from an uncle, but I never use it. You don't have to worry about it."

"Wow," I admired. "I wish I got awesome gifts like this. You know, good camera lenses can be more expensive than the camera itself? It's a real money-burning hobby." Photography may not be an actual hobby of mine, but I learned a thing or two from my picture-loving father.

"Really?" the girl asked in awe as she bent down to tighten her shoe laces. "I'm glad I don't care much for it then. It's a shame that you lost yours though."

"Um, yeah that sucked," I laughed dryly, wondering who had relayed the lie from my first day's flustered introduction. My fingers poked at the many buttons until a screen flickered on. "I was just wondering, I mean it's no big deal, but how do you know so much about me?"

I probably shouldn't have asked that. Otome's composure crumpled like a rose in a hail storm, and she returned to her previous state of reservation. She jolted up from her kneeling position and turned away to fiddle with a basketball that sat next to her duffel bag.

"I-it's just what I've heard, that's all," she dismissed with a wave of her hand. "My friends have never met anyone from America before, so they're really interested in you. I think they got the information from someone in your class. They talk about you a lot."

"Do they now?"

Great, just what I needed, more attention from the local populous. At this rate, I'd have the whole school following me around and nagging at me with irrelevant banter and complications. This is probably the highest level of popularity I've ever achieved, and it's never been more unwelcome. But when she brought up her friends, something about them prodded at the back of my mind. Something cruel...

"It just occurred to me, didn't one of your friends say you liked foreign guys?" I asked with a tint of unease. I've been having more and more difficulty thinking before I speak. "Because-"

"Oh wow, we've wasted too much time already! I'm gonna start warming up." the athlete yelled out abruptly after standing rigid like a board. She dribbled the ball onto the court toward one of the baskets, each step squeaking against the polished flooring. "Just go ahead and start taking pictures whenever you think they'll look good."

"Alright..." I called back weakly. Avoiding any further awkward conversation seemed a blessing. Too bad my big mouth worked in favor of my social downfall. With the black piece of hardware locked in my hands, I brought its viewfinder up to my face.

A blinding flare lit up the gym for a split second when I captured a test photo to reassure myself that I knew what I was doing. At least this thing functions the same as any other camera. Now that its storage held a gorgeous depiction of my feet, I could focus on the basketball player who, from the racket her shoes were creating, was currently going to town on that court.

Her stamping feet appeared to inhabit both the air and the ground simultaneously, an omnipresent blur. With each jump her figure cleared through space and slammed into the basket with relative ease. The image of her body sailing through the air while her shirt fluttered behind screamed super powers. I tried my best to predict and photograph the climax of each dunk, but my attention continued to stray. The audible swish of each precise toss perked my ears and brought a sense of satisfaction I had not known previously. I never cared much for sports, but if it was always like this, I wish I had.

She glided up and down the court, dancing between invisible opponents with the grace of an Olympic figure skater. More than once I had to force myself from standing and gawking and remember that I had a job to do. Despite her elaborate and fast-paced movement, her face glistened not with sweat, but pure determination that burned in her thin, furrowed brow. Never before had I witnessed someone evolve so dramatically and suddenly in demeanor and act with such palpable purpose. The sight left my lungs hungry for air.

Maybe I was overreacting, perhaps my exhausted brain had become vulnerable and easily impressed, but I could not deny that her skill surpassed the average student. I began to realize how quiet the gym was, other than her smacking steps and the clicks of the camera. Should I compliment her? That wouldn't be awkward, would it? I feel like I need to let her know just how impressed I am. Right now.

"You're amazing!"

"Eh-?" came Otome's tiny whimper before she lost her footing and tripped over the ball. At the sound of my comment, her head had snapped in my direction and her concentration had severed from the sport like a cutlass through a taught string. I could only watch from afar in horror as the poor girl became victimized by gravity, plummeting in a pile of sprawling limbs.

"I'm so sorry!" I nearly yelped as I jogged to her fallen form. She leaned on her elbows with teeth grit and eyes scrunched in pain. My worry-smitten self began to fear the worst. "A-are you alright? Can you stand?"

"It's alright, I'm fine," the girl groaned. I extended my hand out for her and she hesitantly grasped it with a hand that felt so much smaller than my own. The thought sent a haunting shiver up my spine before I evicted it and set back to gently levering the girl on to her feet. To my elated relief, she managed to stand evenly without effort. Aside from a few scuffs, her body appeared to have suffered no serious traces of damage. The second she gained her balance, her hand shot from my grasp like cat from water.

"I can't believe I let that happen," she sighed, brushing away at her clothes while hiding her rosy face. "I've never been so stupid before. You didn't capture that did you?"

"Of course I didn't," I reassured with open hands. "And don't beat yourself up over it. It was my fault for yelling out like an idiot. I shouldn't have done that so suddenly, could've thrown anyone's game off."

"Well in a real game there will be a lot more than just one person shouting. I have to do this in front of a crowd, and a screw up like that could cost my team the win."

I watched Otome with slight guilt as she huffed over to her duffel bag and pulled out a bottle of sloshing water. Her throat bobbed with each greedy gulp as I scratched my head with little else to say. A fierce breath parted her shining lips when she pried the bottle away.

"I-I'm sorry, Hudson, I didn't mean for you to see me so upset like this. It's just, ugh, my thoughts have been all over the place lately and I haven't been able to get my head in the game like I used to."

"Oh I know the feeling," I said, nodding my head until my glasses almost fell off. "I've been like that for the last day and a half as well. My brain's been in a whirl, I can hardly think straight."

Otome brightened up with friendly concern and set the bottle down. "Yeah, it must be difficult moving somewhere so far from home. Here, let me take that, I think that's enough pictures for now. So have you been settling in at the school well?"

I walked over and removed the camera strap from around my neck. "You could say that. I guess the school system here isn't too drastically different from back home, and I've definitely been making friends faster than I could have hoped." Maybe faster than I would ever like. "I never would've expected to take on yearbook photo duties within the first couple of days, though."

"Thanks for that, by the way," she smiled as she took the device. "I just don't trust the other kids in the school to take very good photos, and this way I can send in the ones I want used."

"But you trust me?" I pondered aloud while skeptically peering over my glasses. She froze and turned to begin tossing her things into the void of her duffel bag.

"Someone like you popping up with a story as a camera hobbyist just sounded too convenient to pass up. I-it's nothing more than that."

"Alright, if you say so," I replied, covering up my suspicion. I didn't really care either way, I needed to get back to Kotonoha. "Well it's been fun, Katou. I, uh, need to hurry on back to the library now. Hope the pictures I took aren't too off-center."

"W-wait!"

Her sudden outburst caught my fleeing form in mid stride, causing me to slip a few inches on the waxed court. With a subtle slump of my shoulders I shuffled in place like a tank to face her.

"Is there a problem?"

"I-I just remembered, has anyone told you about the events we hold around here?"

Events? Now that she mentioned it, I did feel the itch of some recent memory remnant throbbing away in the folds of my cranium, but I couldn't quite retrieve it.

"No, I haven't gotten a full grasp on the local calendar just yet. Why? Is there going to be some kind of talent show?"

"Nothing like that," she brushed away. "It's sort of a big festival that each class prepares for, we do it every year. Each class has a booth and the students and their families walk around and play games. There's also food and a bunch of other activities."

"Ah! Now that you mention it, I think I heard it in passing somewhere." Heard it in passing? Of course I knew about the festival! The memory hit me like a bucket of ice water. So much potential for disaster, if only I could remember what originally happened at it. I know there's a dance for couples and that Makoto absentmindedly partakes in it with Sekai, but other than that-

"Great, so, uh, you know that most go with a friend, right?" Otome stammered. She had left her bag behind and stood only a couple feet away. Her voice came in dulled breaths, forcing me to lean inward to hear.

"Yes, I think I remember something like that. Why?"

"I was wondering if you would- if you would like to go together..."

If I were back in the real world, this would have turned out to be an elaborate prank, ending with me looking like a desperate child. Of course I've grown more callous since those times, but I could only stare with a crooked eyebrow while she evaded my sight with the cover of her bangs and a sidelong look. This was no joke. She wanted to go to together? With me? Why? Isn't there someone else she would rather spend her time with? I swear this conflicted heavily with a point in the original story, but I couldn't for the life of me remember how. Hold on, I need a minute to think. Just the idea of this is so-

"I-it's just as friends," she finally squeaked to shatter the silence. Her frantic hands molded wrinkles into her white shirt. "It's not like a date or anything, I just don't want to go alone, that's all. And I want to talk to you more about your home country."

Just as friends. Duh just as friends, must I overreact at every little thing? I almost laughed out loud at my flawed train of thought.  _She's the other girl chasing Makoto, remember? Get your head out of the gutter and stop thinking so deeply for once, idiot._

"Of course, yeah sure, I'll go with you," I finally gasped with relief, snagging a finger at my collar. "When is the festival being held exactly?"

Otome's clothing jiggled when she performed a mini jump and her face lit up like a Christmas tree at my response. "It's in two weeks."

"Two weeks?!"

Kotonoha nearly rocketed out of her chair at my reaction. When I returned to the library, I had asked her to confirm the rapid encroachment of the school holiday. The whole journey back was a blur of fast steps and heavy breathing, my rapid gasps bouncing off the school's barren halls. I had barely even said good bye to Otome, which was regrettably rude now that I thought about it. There I go, overreacting again.

"Y-yes, i-is something wrong?" she croaked with startled eyes.

"No, sorry," I lamented as my feet slid under the table while my body slumped in its seat. "It's just, I had a few things planned and there may be a slight possibility of interference." My knuckles dug at my temples and massaged the inflating frustration that bubbled beneath. I had completely forgotten about the festival in the story, and now it was coming up too fast. There was no way I could straighten out these kids in two weeks, was there?

"I'm sure everything will turn out fine," she reassured with warm optimism. I could only grin back in thanks.

"I'm going to go check a few of these books out now," Kotonoha announced as she scooped up her pile of texts. She looked rather silly with so many books clumped together in her dainty arms.

"Uh, here, let me carry some of those," I offered as I jumped up from my seat.

Ten minutes later, the two of us were strolling alongside the streets of Japan. I continued to silently mourn over the fact that Yuuki had not been at the checkout desk, some other kid had taken his place. While we walked, I made a comical effort to juggle Kotonoha's books and send the boy a text simultaneously, but it was no use. Luckily, the train ride proved to be a much needed break, granting time to compose a message that I used to inform him of where I had gone off to since he disappeared and that I would try to contact him tomorrow... What day was tomorrow anyway?

"Hey, Kotonoha, what day is today?" I mumbled over a stack of books sitting on the seat between us.

"It's Thursday, so after tomorrow we have the weekend to look forward to," she answered in her usual innocent tone. "Though I have a student council meeting after school tomorrow."

My spine perked in pleasant surprise. I had started school in the middle of the week, and the notion of weekends had slipped my mind. This was fantastic, two whole days of freedom to mull things over were just around the corner. I revised a bit of my text to Yuuki and asked him if it would just be easier for us to meet up over the weekend. Plenty of time to formulate a potential plan, and anything Sekai and I came up with at lunch tomorrow would be an added bonus.

"I didn't know you were in the student council," I said as we left the train station. A car sauntered by on the peaceful street.

"Oh, yes. In fact I have a lot of planning to do for the upcoming festival," she admitted with a tired look. Her extensive lengths of deep violet hair dangled like exhausted curtains as she aimed her eyes to the ground.

"Don't work yourself too hard, Katsura," I warned with a grin. "If you need any help with that festival stuff, you can come to me about it."

"I couldn't bother you with these things when you've only just gotten here," she giggled, making her shoulders bounce.

"No, really, it's all fine," I insisted. "If that whole ordeal this morning was any indication of the difficulties you face around here, believe me, it's the least I can do."

She hid her face from me once more. "Thank you."

"Well, this is me," I indicated when we stopped before a familiar building. "How much further until your house?"

"Oh, it's not that far," she smiled as she inched closer to receive the books in my hands. "I think I can manage it the rest of the way."

I smirked at her and shook my head. "Don't worry about it, I don't mind carrying these a little longer."

With such a constant air of modesty, you could never tell if she was being truthful or just polite. I failed to control a quick, longing glance at the front door of my home. My paining arms would not forget this.  _Come on man, the least you can do for this tortured girl is carry some of her books a bit further. Besides, a little more walking would do you a world of good. God knows you need the exercise._

Nearly twenty minutes later I was mentally punching myself in the back of the head for insisting on helping her. The hard edges had sunk into the soft flesh of my arms, each step sending out sharp bites of pain. I feared that to loosen my grip just the slightest bit would send the pile of literature to the asphalt, so I settled on squeezing my arms as tightly as possible.

"Thank you so much," Kotonoha bowed as we reached her home's entrance. "I'm sorry it was a longer walk than I may have lead on."

"Hah, it's no problem," I chuckled with a grimace as I continued to strain with the weight. "Now I definitely know not to let you go home alone with so many books."

"Here, um, you can come inside to put those down, if you want," she blushed as she fumbled with the doorknob.

I blanched with my chin resting on a hardcover. She was inviting me into her house? I'd never been into a girl's house before. Were her parents home? They wouldn't misunderstand this situation would they? It's fine, it's cool, it'll just take a second for me to put her books down and be on my way.

"Welcome home big sister!"

"Ah! Stop it, Kokoro, calm down!"

Within seconds of the front door creaking open, a miniature girl blurred from within and latched onto Kotonoha's body like some kind of leech in a fluffy dress. It took Kotonoha a flustered minute to calm her younger sister down and pry her off, and I'm sorry to admit that I thoroughly enjoyed watching her struggle with such an energetic child, even if it meant I had to suffer longer with my heavy load.

"Are you her boyfriend!?" the little girl cried out when she noticed me in the doorway. Her face was nothing but wide, gleaming eyes.

"Ah, no I-"

With a strength beyond the limitations of a girl her size, Kokoro ran to my rear and shoved me toward a quaint little living room with vanilla walls, giggling loudly all the way.

"Come in, come in!"

"W-wait a minute, Kokoro, stop bothering him!" Kotonoha flustered as she followed. "Here, Hudson, let's go upstairs so you can put those books down."

"Aw, you're no fun keeping him all to yourself big sis," the girl pouted as Kotonoha tugged my coat sleeve to the stairs.

Too much happening too fast, I could barely take anything in while I followed along. I only caught fleeting images of the house's simple yet elegant decorum before I found myself in a very foreign and feminine room. This is a girl's room. I'm in a girl's room. I'm in  _Kotonoha's_  room. How did this happen?

"You can just dump those over there," she said, gesturing to a very comfortable looking bed.

With a grunt I released the pile of books and nearly fell backward from the sudden imbalance. My arms were stiff and I could feel the blood throb in my hands. My fingers pressed and prodded into the sore tissue of my arms as I attempted to accelerate the circulation. While I massaged my arms, I took the moment to gape around at the room's furnishings: an endless shelf of books, a tidy desk with stacked papers, a round vanity, and a small television, all surrounding a book-draped bed. A cute and clean atmosphere.

"I-it's nothing special," she said when she noticed my gaze.

"Hah, are you kidding? You should see my room, it's a jungle in there. Yours actually looks like it belongs to someone who has it all together."

"Would you like some tea?" she asked after shaking her head in bashful innocence at my comment. Her face was a blur of crimson and her hair tossed around in a jumble with her head.

"I don't want to be a bother-"

"It's no trouble at all!" she interrupted before sending a hand to her mouth. Geez, people here really loved cutting you off. Hmm... poor choice of words.

"I mean," she continued. "I want to repay you for helping me with my books, even though it's not much. I don't mind at all."

"Well if you're sure, I guess that'll be fine then," I chuckled sheepishly. "Hopefully it will be just as delectable as your cooking from lunch the other day."

Kotonoha beamed until she disappeared into the hall while I internally cringed with regret. If her previous cooking is anything to go by, I'm in for a rough next few minutes. Maybe I can hole my nose without her noticing..

"Hey, you didn't answer my question!"

I spun to find the culprit of the sudden yell floating in the bedroom doorway. Kotonoha's little sister flashed a toothy smile at me while I stared back, my mind still reeling from the shock of her sudden apparition.

"What question was that?" I asked cautiously with my hands in my pockets.

"Are you my sister's new boyfriend?" she asked with her head cocked to the side like a curious bird. "I heard about you yesterday! She's been so happy since she made a bunch of friends."

It was such a humbling statement that I actually felt my stomach respond with a warm fluttery sensation. It began to occur to me that Kotonoha really hasn't had a lot of friends her whole life, has she? To have been alone for so long and suddenly gain a kindly, albeit loud, group of friends as well as a boyfriend, of course she'd run home in soaring spirits. I never realized just how drastic an effect we would have on her, and that made it all the more tragic that I would have to tear it down for the greater good...

"No, I'm not her boyfriend," I laughed uneasily. Thinking about it racked my nerves with tendrils of dull anxiety. The little girl's shoulders slumped in disappointment, hitting me with a fresh pang of guilt.

"Are you sure?" she frowned, her enormous eyes shining with sorrow. "Aw, I wanted to meet my new older brother since Big Sis doesn't really talk about it. But does that make you one of her new friends?"

I searched the ceiling for an answer before replying. "Sure, I guess you could call us friends... maybe? We haven't really talked much, your sister and I. By the way, what was your name again? Mine's Rupert."

"I'm Kokoro!" she blurted out. "Nice to meet you!"

I almost lost my footing at her outburst, she nearly blew out my ear drums. A quick succession of light thumps could be heard coming from the hall, then Kotonoha's head appeared around the doorway. Presented upon her hands was a large silver tea tray weighed down with tea essentials. I've never actually had tea from a traditional pot before.

"Kokoro?!" Kotonoha yelled loudly, or at least as loud as her soft voice would allow. "Stop bothering Hudson and get out of my room!"

With a frantic wave, the little girl skipped out of the room, but not before sticking her tongue out at her sister in a fantastic show of sibling rivalry. Kotonoha's cheeks puffed in red response. It seemed so strange to think that Kotonoha could be involved in such a typical family situation such as this. All the violence she would mix herself with in the show just became infinitely more heartbreaking.

"Sorry about that, I don't know what's gotten into her," she groaned as she balanced the tray over to her desk and gently lowered it. "Here."

With a movement that caught my senses off-guard, Kotonoha brandished a silvery object in her hand. She held it out in my direction with a speed so alarming that it squeezed a tight gasp from my throat. I jumped a step back, my instincts momentarily blinding me of any sensible logic.

"Hudson? A-are you okay?" echoed a concerned voice through the red haze that clouded my vision.

I blinked and stared at Kotonoha's worried face then gradually shifted focus to her outstretched hand, a shiny tea cup in its grasp. A quick shake of my head and the perilous fog dissipated immediately, as though it had never impaired my sight.

"Huh? Y-yeah yeah," I babbled while I reached for the offered cup. "Sorry, Katsura, I just- I thought- never mind, it's nothing. Please, don't worry about it."

"O-oh, okay," she replied. For a moment, she looked like she wanted to say more, but withheld herself.

Even after that, Kotonoha still managed to serve me tea with a cute smile. It took a solid few minutes of sipping before another word was said between us, though. Surprisingly, she decided to lead in breaking the silence for once. At first she talked as though she measured each word with self-conscious vigilance, perhaps still fearful of my freakout. She started out asking me about my home back in America and what it was like there. Apparently she hoped to move there one day for educational purposes. Her speech steadily grew more and more fast-paced with each question, I felt like a wooden hut under siege by a chatty cannon, but I held strong.

"You've never had sushi?" she asked with wide-eyed amazement.

"Can't say I have," I mouthed between sips of tea. How had I not been addicted to this stuff before? "I've never really cared for fish personally."

She shook her head with a bemused smile before glancing up at the wall behind me. Her mouth rounded in contained astonishment.

"Wow, we've been talking for almost an hour now," she giggled while she watched me guzzle down another cup of tea.

"It's been that long already?" I gagged, almost sputtering out a mouthful of tea. Well I guess it made sense now that I thought about it. Kotonoha had refilled the tea pot nearly three times. "I should probably be heading home."

"Thanks again for helping me with my books," Kotonoha said as she accompanied me to her front yard.

"It was no problem, thanks for having me over," I shrugged with one brushing back a side of hair. "And honestly, thanks for the tea. That stuff was amazing."

A brilliant red blush was all she could muster in response. Her previous attitude that instilled the bombardment of conversation had quickly faded away. Easy come easy go I guess.

"Well, I'll see you at school tomorrow, Katsura," I said as I waved and began marching down the sidewalk. A deeper, sleepier blue clawed at the edges of the sky, the sun gently succumbing to the night's will. Still no busy life on the street, only a passing car here and there. I could live with a quiet neighborhood like this. Sure, nausea of homesickness flipped my stomach every time I thought about it, but for now I could take in the comfort of knowing that my reality could not reach me with its stressfulness. A conflicting mix of pros and cons banged within my skull.

I sighed and pushed my inner turmoil aside. At least the walk back shouldn't be as painfully long-

"Um, hold on a minute!" came Kotonoha's feathery cry.

"What's up?" I asked with a spin of my heel, ignoring the sinking feeling that I knew the situation. The girl stood only ten feet from me at the front of her home

"I just wanted to know," she spouted with her eyes closed and porcelain hands clenched at her chest in a sort of blind determination. "If you wouldn't mind calling me by my first name."

I stared with the dormant gaze of a maggot-ridden zombie for a few seconds before the impact of the statement hit home. She wanted me to call her by her first name? That's kind of a big, social deal isn't it?

"If you really want me to... sure I can do that," I nodded. What harm could it bring? "But in return you'll also have to start calling me Rupert. Using my last name makes me feel like a school teacher or something."

"Okay!" she agreed, her mouth stretching with joy and her face glowing with maroon merriment. "Then it's a deal, Rupert."

"It's a deal, Kotonoha."


	8. Instilled With Lassitudinous Distress

"How long have you been waiting there?"

I eased the door shut behind me, releasing only a quiet mechanical click into the still morning. Kotonoha stood at the edge of the small patio, amethyst eyes edging around my gaze and her hands clutching at her bulky messenger bag. Her wispy eyebrows wobbled with unease. From what I could tell, she had been in the midst of deciding whether or not to knock. When I had opened the door, I could just barely make out the scurrying of her retreat over the creak of the hinges.

"I-I only just got here," she reassured, leaving me unconvinced. "Oh my, your eyes are so dark. Have you been sleeping well?"

I suddenly became self-conscious of my appearance and dragged a vain hand across my tired eyes. My morning routines usually involved avoiding mirrors like they would stab my sternum with large cooking instruments. I still had a hard time not astonishing myself with the stranger who stared back.

"Really? I guess I've just been a bit restless these last couple of days, it's no big deal. But, uh, you're not being harassed again, are you?" I asked with a quick scan of the street. How many times could I fake calling the police before the moment required more physical means? My combat skills probably sat somewhere between a flimsy scarecrow and an overcooked carrot. Even worse with the lack of rest lately.

"N-no, no," she dismissed, waving her hands about. "Nothing like that. It occurred to me that since we live so close to each other it would seem natural to walk to school together... If that's alright I mean."

Did there exist any other option that wouldn't tax mercilessly on my conscience?

"Yeah, I guess that would make sense," I shrugged. "I just hope you're prepared for the horrific onslaught of my boring presence."

Her closed eyes smiled up at me and sent unrestrainable sparks of contagious cheer through the core of my being. I began to wonder just how long it would take before she began to detest me. For the sake of my safety, maybe I shouldn't hang around to find out.

And so the first of what I believed to be many accompanied walks began. Kotonoha had the uncanny ability to keep a conversation going while also keeping my full attention, a rare feat. She continued from where we left off yesterday, poking me with a surplus of questions, but she also attempted at levering out more personal information that almost had me worried. I ended up giving out my phone number, my favorite food (spinach calzone), the kind of music I listen to, hobbies, old friends, preference of color (violet), favorite movies, whether or not I've taken martial arts (Ha ha), and relationship status (N/A). That last question would have shot off a few distress flares had our arrival at the train station not distracted me.

We greeted Makoto with casual words and soon after, sauntered aboard the rickety train once more. The two love birds perched themselves upon one of the burgundy cushioned benches while I insisted on standing. Unfortunately, the ride failed to provide an adequate opportunity to talk to the boy about Sekai. Not with Kotonoha here. In fact, with my full-to-bursting schedule, a practical moment of peace with the kid at any point in the day was beyond any fizzle of power in my grasp.

I would go on and provide every crucial detail of my classes before lunch, but I slept through nearly every minute of every hour. The teachers even ignored my lack of attention, unwilling to deal with the awkward situation.

I slept a few minutes into lunch before the clucking and guffaws of the students slapped me awake. It took me a minute to realize my only chance at talking to Makoto today had just sailed in a golden yacht, zipping right by my desert island. I trudged out through the classroom door and spied out the first student I recognized from my class.

"Excuse me, you're Sawanaga, are you not?"

A towering scarecrow of a guy with a mess of tree bark hair stuck out from the busy hallway outside the classroom. He spun around with more energy than necessary and emoted a comical face of confusion at my presence. When he looked at my face, he burst in silent shock.

"Yes, that's me," he mumbled with a strange, uneasy look. " Oh, you're that Hudson kid from my class. Man, you look exhausted, are you alright?"

"Yeah, I'm fine." I replied with a fake beam that strained my lips. "I heard you were friends with Makoto, so I was just wondering if you knew where he went."

Taisuke Sawanaga. I didn't have to overhear the murmuring group of girls with mildly annoyed masks to remember this kid. He's the character that sat on the receiving end of more than a few humorous scenarios. It took only two words to summarize this guy's role in the story: comic relief. But my gut informed me that wasn't all there was to him.

"Ah, I think I saw him run off to have lunch with Katsura."

An unforeseen flame of anger began to fester in the pit of my stomach when he mentioned Kotonoha. Indecent images flashed red-tinged through my vision and I had to lock the features of my face in place to keep them from twisting and disclosing my inner turmoil. This guy did something to her, the details are fuzzy, but it wasn't good. Behind his cheery facade and silly passes at women hid just another lecherous degenerate. This school had a knack for them.

"Is that so?" I coughed with a dry chuckle. "I'll just have to talk to him some time after school then. Thanks anyway."

Before the confused teen could spit out another "Eh", I turned and sped off down the nearest hall, dragging my heavy limbs at a clumsy pace. The moment I rounded a corner I withheld my steps to a slower gait, conscious of the many amused and unsure stares I had earned from the hustling crowds of students. I twisted my head around in case the kid had decided to follow me. Another second of unwanted conversation with that guy and I'd be letting forth a flood of colorful, insulting thoughts that had no right to exist in this world yet. Or at least glare at him and make him uncomfortable.

**Thump!**

A small body bashed into my chest with a force that aggressively expunged the air from my lungs like a battering ram into a hot air balloon. I stumbled a few paces in reverse with my eyes squashed in pain and a hand clutching at my chest.  _Never a dull moment around here._

With a deep intake of air I muttered an apology and peered down at my victim. Way down.

"Ow," the short girl groaned with a blank stare as she pressed a hand to her face. Her stature forced me to look ground-ward at a near ninety-degree angle for a proper view. Irises made from bottomless garnet peered right back up from beneath a crop of hair fashioned from bruised evergreens, held together by a flowing crimson bow.

"Sorry, sorry," I continued to stammer with a deflated energy. "I wasn't paying attention."

"Hey, you're that new exchange student in my class," she droned with a mysterious lack of emotion. Her deadpan voice reminded me of a robot.

"Uh, yeah. Do I know..? Oh wait," It had taken my sluggish thought processing to put face to memory, but I managed. "You're a friend of Sekai's."

My poker-faced assailant gave a slow nod in response and lowered her hand. My ability to dig up a name escaped me, but I did recall that this girl was Sekai's closest friend. At least I'm pretty sure. She was smart, ambitious, and I think part of the student council or something of the sort. For the time being, that's about the limit of my knowledge. Now I just needed to remember what other characters I've forgotten...

"Yes, you can call me Kiyoura."  _Ah, there we go._  "You're on your way to see her now, aren't you?"

"Why yes I am," I responded with a defensive grimace. "She's been taking a liking to having lunch on the roof. She hasn't been neglecting her friends now, has she?"

"No," she said blankly. "She actually... never mind."

My legs swayed awkwardly and I rubbed at a sudden itch pestering the rear of my scalp. I tried not to look into the piercing gaze that reflected my sight back into my soul. If this girl felt as uncomfortable as I did, she made an outstanding effort to keep it under wraps.

"Take care of her," her voice whispered against my ear. I jerked my face up to find myself facing an empty space. Without my notice, Kiyoura had stealthed by, leaving only a faint brush of wind in her wake. I resisted the urge to turn around and inquire about the ominous message, but I had already wasted too much of the lunch period. Hopefully a decent meal would bless my mind's slow crawl with a much needed jump start.

* * *

"Ugh, your phone is so  _boring._ "

I nearly knocked off the lunch on the bench between us onto the graveled roof when I noticed Sekai's face peeking over my shoulder. That bold strand that stuck out from the top of her head nearly gouged my eye given how close she was. I snapped the phone shut and clacked it on the bench by my side; having it bulge in my pocket felt uncomfortable while sitting. The message that had me so distracted had been from Yuuki, and he agreed that a meeting over the weekend would be most beneficial. Let's just hope fate thinks so too.

"Um, private space please," I intoned as I shot back from her giggling eyes. "And what do you mean? It looks like anyone else's phone. Doesn't it?"

"I mean its background," she jabbed with a finger. "Yours could do with a more personal flair. Haven't you heard of the charm going around?"

_Yes._  "No, and I don't really believe in any of that superstitious stuff all the kids go crazy over. By the way, this lunch? Five stars."

I managed to distract her for a moment with my surprise compliment, tinting her cheeks the color of rubies. She scrunched in a grin and waved the comment away with a "Thanks" before returning to the topic I would rather avoid.

"But that charm, maybe it'll help with you actually finding someone to hold dear," she snickered as she wrapped her arms around her torso and wriggled while making embarrassing smooch noises. I could only look on in horror. "If you put the picture of the one you love as your phone's wallpaper, and no one finds out for a while, then your feelings will be returned."

"Yes, well that's all fine and everything, but we should be focusing on  _your_ love life, rather," I sighed and engulfed another rice ball with the grace of a hippo after dental surgery. My cheeks bounced as I gnashed away at the girl's delicious lunch when a sideways glance at Sekai froze my jowls. Worried trenches dug into her knitted brow while her seamed mouth danced like a twitchy caterpillar. I vacated my mouth with a painful swallow and decided we had grown close enough for me to express my friendly concern.

"Something troubling you, Sekai?" I poked with her first name. Earlier I had forgotten her demand to be called as such, resulting in a rather physical headlock that left me flustered and overheated.

"Ah- well, it's just," she stuttered harder than a waterlogged car battery. "About yesterday, with Makoto..."

She trailed off and continued to instate the ground as the most captivating piece of scenery in the area. I prodded up and down at her slumped figure with my darting eye. What could have happened yesterday to put her in such a mood so suddenly? Sure, apparently Makoto was trying to bury any obvious urges he had that may disclose his feelings to Sekai, but that's to be expected since he already has a girlfriend. I mean, the only objection I had against Sekai ripping the boy away and into her grasp was that I knew Kotonoha to be too mentally fragile to take such a harsh rejection. Regrettably, I couldn't tell anyone, forcing me to place more faith than I was capable of in these kids.

"You're not that bothered about yesterday, are you?" I sighed. "You have nothing to worry about, he's just a really shy guy with some clearly conflicting feelings. Just keep getting him to really open his eyes to you until he figures out that Kotonoha just isn't-"

"It's not that." she muttered at the ground in a hollow voice.

My back creaked and the folds in my blazer shifted as I righted my posture slightly at her reply. She looked so morale deprived compared to the usual hop-skip energy she had expressed only moments ago. It was as though she had a switch she could flip at will to instantly mold her mood, like a renowned movie actress. I could feel the telltale prongs of anxiety pricking at my heart in my confusion. An absentminded hand brushed up against my face to push my glasses up the bridge of my nose.

"I-if you don't want to talk about it, it's fine," I added finally after brushing at a loose strand irritating my forehead. "But know that I'm totally here to help you with Makoto and that-"

"If I tell you," she interrupted once more, turning her head only the smallest fraction in my direction. "Promise you won't be angry at me."

Angry at her? What could she have possibly done that would make her fear angering me? I myself can't imagine a single scenario that would cause me to feel enmity towards her, she was too likable, even if she did slap me at one point. There's nothing she could have said to the boy that would cause me any sort of discomfort, unless of course she decided to reveal our entire operation. She wouldn't dare, would she? Oh dear, did she already go and kiss him abruptly like in the show? No, she doesn't know something like that would upset me for the sake of Kotonoha. I'm sure she'd believe that to have the opposite effect on me...

"You're kind of scaring me a bit there, but there's no way I could get angry at y-"

"Just promise me," she said with a quiet sternness that jabbed at my resolve.

"Sure. Fine," I assured with hurried nods. "I promise I won't be angry with you. You have my word."

Sekai exhaled a long breath and lurched up to her feet before treading over to the roof fence. I turned and watched the girl look out over the school grounds, a nervous twinge upsetting my senses. Her thin hands reached out and coiled around the fence's rings. The entwined metal rings sagged ever so slightly and her knuckles blossomed white with her tightening grip. Her face hid beneath shadows, silhouetted against the midday sun. She leaned her forehead against the metal.

"I didn't go."

I cogitated in perplexed silence for a few seconds, unaware of her meaning.

"You- you didn't go where?" I inquired.

"Yesterday. I never went shopping with Makoto."

My face began to contort into a look of confusion and disbelief without my knowing. I brought a shaking hand across my brow to wipe away a bead of sweat.

"I don't understand," I said with a synthetic chuckle. "What do you mean you-"

"I mean I lied in that text!" she stomped and spun to confront my face. Her glittering pools of liquid lavender threatened to spill over. I could feel my heart freezing in place, then bursting into wild fluxes. My legs attempted to pick my body off the bench, but such an effort was futile. I could only steady myself by locking my arms at my sides.

"Wh- But, but the text... you had said Makoto was worrying over Kotonoha..." My words came out desperate and without confidence.

"He told me that after school," she uttered with a choked whimper, her eyes dipping to avoid my own. "We split off as soon as we made it to the train station after leaving school."

"But why, Sekai?" I asked with tired shoulders. This unexpected ordeal drained me of my last dregs of reserve energy. "Why did you lie to me?"

"I don't know," came her dispirited reply.

My rigid arms slackened off and I slumped back against the stiff bench with a sigh. I curled my head into my hands. What the hell did she mean she didn't know? Is she playing me for some kind of fool? I can't trust her to let me help her if the smallest thing she says may turn out to be a complete lie. For no apparent reason as well.

"You promised not to be angry."

"I-I know," I breathed. "I just- Don't you want me to help you with Makoto? You want to be with him, right?"

"I don't know," she repeated in a tinier voice.

"What about before, when I'd told you all those things about your feelings for him, you said I was right. You admitted that what I said was the truth," I affirmed with contained frustration. Stressed fingers sifted through my hair as I clenched my eyes. "How can you not know?"

"I don't- I can't tell how I feel anymore," she half cried. "My- I can't stop thinking..."

"What? You can't stop thinking about what?" I jabbed with a sudden fierceness as my frustration leaked out in bursts. Sekai visibly flinched and I slid back in my seat, surprised at the elevation of my own voice. My patience had worn away without my notice, hidden from my weary eyes.

"Sorry," I exhaled quietly. "I didn't mean to yell like that, my lack of sleep is catching up with me. I'm not usually one for random outbursts."

The whites of the girl's eyes gradually shrank as calm concern bled into them. She now stared into my face and took a few steps closer. I gazed up at her subtle frown while I sat there with what I hoped to be an apologetic look. My reflexes sent a gasping bounce through my shoulders when her timid hand hovered close and lifted the glass frames from my face. She held them aside and the world whisked away into an indecipherable smear. I instinctively squinted against the blurry shapes.

"Your eyes," she spoke in hushed shock. "It's so dark around them. I can't believe I hadn't noticed before. Why haven't you been sleeping?"

"It's no big deal, really," I insisted as I reached out in a blind attempt at retrieving my eyesight. "Could you please give those back? I can't see a thing and we should be focusing on you. No pun intended."

"You really can't see?" Sekai piped with a hint of astonishment. I could spy her form inching nearer as if a closer inspection would aid in proving my disability. "How bad is your eyesight?"

"I can see barely over a few inches without aid," I groaned, growing uncomfortable with the realization that her minimizing proximity actually allowed her hazy figure to come into focus by the slightest degree. A faint, feminine aroma of diluted roses and delicate sweetness ensnared and disrupted my senses. My brow sprouted with a bud of sweat. I continued to wave my hand about as if feeling for a light switch in a pitch black room.

"Now come on, what's distracting you from Makoto?"

Sekai stood in still silence. I could hear only the distant chirping of the local pigeons and the nearing steps of the girl before me. My eyes drooped with fatigue as I waited for her to respond in some manner, but my heart still beat the drum of a nervous squirrel. Without my glasses, I was vulnerable to anything. Especially knives.

"Sek-"

My brain failed to keep track of the explosion of lightning fast events. A sharp rustle of clothing caught my ear just before my voice was forcibly cut off. Something strong but dainty tentacled into my outstretched hand and before I could pull it away, a great weight bowled into me and almost pasted my back along the bench. My phone clattered to the ground. I grunted as I tried to wiggle out from the sitting weight pushing down on my waist, but in my current condition it was no use.

"W-what are you doing, Sekai?" I gasped up at the shadow that pinned me down. Clenched in my previously empty hand was yet another hand, soft and warm, pressing my own against the bench.

"I'm going to show you what's been distracting me..."

Her hot perfume intensified and I could feel the moisture from her airy pants condense on my skin. By the time my stretched eyes could see her face, I knew it was too late. I pulled my head back as far as my neck would allow. A final blast of smoldering air dusted my lips before her own pressed down upon them. Gentle at first, then with a grinding that worked to blend our mouths into one. She made oxygen a luxury. Her grasp on my hand tightened while her free hand tangled itself in my scalp, almost painfully. An objecting moan escaped my mouth into hers, sounding more indecent than I intended.

No.  _No. This is wrong. This can't be happening... Fight it. Fight it!_

I mustered every ounce of will power within to repel the clouds that threatened to overtake my thoughts. With a last effort, I lifted my unhindered hand up to push against her, but it just ended up looking like an intimate embrace. She felt hot to the touch and she saw my attempt as an invitation to nuzzle her body closer. My eyelids began to drift down, my traitorous body having decided that this wasn't so bad.

And seconds later, it was over. The kiss broke off with a suction sound when Sekai jerked her head back to look down at me, her forehead leaning against mine. Sweet, life-giving air froze my drizzled lips with each sharp breath. I imagined I looked as disheveled as she did: hair tossed about, chest heaving, cheeks as rosy as boiled lobsters, and uncertain eyes still recovering from a surge of primal passion. My face probably carried a more apparent look of horrified shock. Her hand brushed against my cheek like a nurturing breeze as she replaced my glasses.

"Why...?" I croaked, still paralyzed beneath her. I could spout nothing witty.

"I... I-"

The chiming metronome of the school bell vibrated around the roof, and I suddenly remembered where we were. Sekai shot off of me like my body had burned her, an entirely plausible scenario given how profusely I was sweating. Her lifted weight allowed a refreshing gust to lick my face. With more effort than should be necessary, I cranked into a sitting position, dazed, confused, and terrified.

"C-come on," Sekai said calmly as she picked up her lunch containers. "We're going to be late."

She traipsed off to the door without a backward glance. My mouth continued to hang open after her, gaping until her hand reached for the door knob. Her back looked miles away and when I looked down it felt like I sat atop a looming skyscraper. I lurched my popping knees into a stand and quickly regretted getting up. The edges of my vision blinked and bloomed into circles of night, expanding until they became walls of darkness in my peripheral. The slipping strength in my limbs grew in direct proportion to my darkening vision.

"Rupert? Rupert!"

Sekai's voice reached me before my eyes registered her turning around, as though her voice rippled from the future. I responded to the call by buckling at my knees. The fading echoes of a high-pitched shriek slapped my faltering ears before a screen of graveled flooring tumbled into view and cemented the darkness.


	9. Opulent Precipitation

Cold. A loitering, thorough chill. That was the first sensation I could register when I regained consciousness, the second being a concerning realization that I couldn't move my legs. Oh, no wait... there they go. I'm just taped down by a very tight but thin sheet. I squinted against the brightness of the room, a glowing blur of white. Instinctively, I reached out for my glasses on a nightstand I hoped existed. Bingo.

The blur faded away but the white didn't. My head spun like a top and it took everything I had not to topple over. I twisted my neck around at the sterile lack of hue surrounding my bed, plaster walls illuminated by the graying afternoon beams burning through the large window. Swelling bulbs of puffy ashes gathered in the sky, preparing to unleash their watery stash. Empty beds lined on each side of my own, curtains all drawn back. The front of the school was visible through the large window. I guess I haven't been moved very far, I must be in the nurse's office. Why am I here?

Quick pitter-pattering steps beat somewhere, dulled by the insulating walls. Someone must be running pretty hard for the sound to reach in here. I twitched when a door across from the windows clicked open, and I instinctively plowed my head back into a fluffy pillow and shut my eyes. My senses were still a little scattered, so I would prefer to avoid any unnecessary conversation.

"You're still asleep?" a feminine voice called quietly. Footsteps, then a stretch of silence.

It was familiar, but obscure. That's not Kotonoha's voice, is it? I lay still as a possum before a grumbling bear, concentrating on deep, sleepy breaths and canceling any facial twitches. This was probably a bit too childish. What if it's the school nurse?

"Wake up already. I left practice early just to check on you," the voice panted. "Why is it so cold in here?"

Oh, that's why she sounded so familiar. At least I made the right call in feigning sleep; the last thing I need right now is for someone to run me though a probing interrogation. She cut short practice?

"Hmm, your glasses are still on."

From beneath my vacant face, a tangled mess of curses and insults aimed at my forgetful self erupted. I clenched the sheets when the familiar brush of fingers graced my cheeks and my glasses were once again removed by an outside force. A second later they clacked back down where they previously sat.

"You're gonna to love how famous you've become," the girls snorted. "Seems like passing out on the roof with a girl turned out to be the perfect gossip."

I passed out? With a girl? That doesn't sound like me... _Oh no_...

My eyes flapped open and I sprung upright before immediately falling back after a slap of disorientation racked my head into submission. I blindly clutched at my right temple. Beside the bed, Otome yelped loudly and backed into the nearby wall. She placed her hand upon her chest and giggled lightheartedly as she watched my floundering form.

"Geez, don't get up so suddenly like that," she smiled as she stepped from the wall. "But at least you're alright."

I attempted to prop myself on my elbows for the slightest support, but that proved too difficult as well. In the end, I gave up and remained on my back, my head turned to face the girl. With a lazy hand, I pointed in the general direction of my glasses. With an understanding nod she rewarded me with their plastic touch upon my hand. An image of Otome in her basketball uniform focused before me, her skin shimmering with a thin film of sweat.

"Thanks," I croaked, cringing at the rasp of my own voice. I held a hand to my mouth as I gave a gruff cough to clear my throat. "Where is she?"

"Who are you talking about?" she frowned. "And would you like some water? You sound almost as bad as you look."

I replied with a quick shake of my head.

"Thank you, but I'm fine for now. The girl, though, the one I was with on the roof, do you know where she is?"

Otome's shoulders wilted a degree.

"O-oh, you mean Sekai," she said with a more mellowed tone. "She's probably gone home for the day. You've been in here for a few hours now. I think the nurse may have forgotten about you."

I rubbed a crater into my forehead, hoping that a brief massage would refresh my mind.  _Alright, let's review the last few things I remember. Walked to school with Kotonoha. Had lunch on the roof with Sekai. She didn't go shopping with Makoto. Frustrating internal struggle. I inquired as to why. She kissed me in reply. End film._

Mental relief evaded my grasp and I was instead greeted again by the unforgiving landslide of a headache. This is all a joke, right? They're all just pushing my buttons and in the end we'll all have a good laugh while everyone goes back to being good friends with no potential for bloody conflict.

But Sekai kissed me! I think I'm going to vomit. Not from the kiss itself, no. Regrettably, I enjoyed that more than I should have. I just can't imagine how much more muddled things could get. I've just lost a very prominent ally. Then again, maybe... maybe I've unlocked a workable answer to all this...

If Sekai's feelings truly have changed, which honestly is a big 'if', then I don't have to continue to push her on to Makoto. He and Kotonoha can continue their relationship unhindered, no violence or bad blood. I just have to keep Sekai locked onto myself but... I don't know... Sure she's nice, easy on the eyes, to put it lightly. She's gorgeous, but it feels so wrong for reasons I can't explain. Or maybe I can, but I don't want to think about it. I've never even taken the route of a romantic partner. The sheer fact that I've received so much attention from Sekai alone has everything I believed in a meat grinder.

And beyond that, I can't stay here forever. I need to go home someday, the home with real people. If this had been any other jolly world of color and animation I'd reconsider… But this…

_I need to confront Makoto. Soon._

"Hey, about Sekai..."

Otome's voice ripped my thoughts away and brought me back to her large eyes. They looked sad. When she noticed my return of focus she dropped her gaze from mine.

"Yes?" I asked with interest. "What about her?"

"Er... You and her," she mumbled softly. "Are you two going out together?"

I hesitated before chuckling nervously, my cheeks heating faster than black tar in the middle of summer. Had word gotten out about what happened on the roof between us? Had someone seen?  _Calm down, it's just general suspicion._

I made an effort to force a toothy grin. "What on earth would make you think that?"

"Nothing," she sighed as she smiled back. "I just heard you two had become close friends recently, so I was just curious."

"Uh, yeah, just friends," I stumbled. I threw a habitual finger down to my collar bone to loosen my tie only to tug at nothing. With a quick glance I finally realized the only clothes I had on were my pants and collared shirt. My coat and tie had been dumped by my feet.

"Oh, would you like me to help you with those?" Otome asked kindly, having caught my gaze.

I clenched my brow at her and wore an amused smirk. "It's not like I've lost any of my motor skills, Katou. I think I can manage it on my own."

"You need to take it easy and get home as soon as possible," she replied brusquely, blind siding me with her sudden sternness.

With a grunt, I sat up into a sitting position, pushing against the unforgiving might of gravity. The strain shot stars across my vision, which I quickly fluttered away with my eyelids. I wavered slightly before I noticed Otome's quizzical look.

"Maybe you should stay here a little longer..."

"No," I uttered, gingerly plucking my legs from beneath the sheets. "I'm ready to get up. I really need to see someone."

"Like I said," she sighed as she reached over and held up my coat. "School's been out for an hour or so now. Most people have gone home. It's the weekend, after all."

She gestured for me to hold out my arms. I begrudgingly complied and stuck my hands out like a scarecrow while she slipped the blazer over my features. She stood close enough for the warmth of her body to slough off onto mine. My nose wrestled with an entangled fume of sweat and flowery deodorant, the aftermath of her shortened practice session. With a quick tug, she knotted my tie on and took a step back to admire her handiwork.

"Can't you sit up a little straighter?" she complained.

I responded with a subdued glower. My shoes had been placed conveniently down on this side of the bed. I slipped my socked soles in and tested the waters.  _Leg joints feel sturdy enough..._

I pushed from the bedside onto my knees, my tired joints jittering with the movement, but holding well enough. Otome seemed ready to jump at me the entire time, anticipating my downfall. I nodded to her.

"Thanks," I said. "It looks like I can walk, but I feel only a little sturdier than a toothpick."

"You look it," she giggled with an uncertain look. "So, are you heading home?"

"In a bit. Is the library still open?"

"The library? What for?" she asked with a hint of suspicion.

I squinted at her inquiringly. "Does it matter?"

"It's to see that girl again, isn't it?

It took a few seconds for my social skills to process just how blunt that question had been. Otome's eyes had darkened and she glared with a hidden intensity that I didn't know she contained. It unnerved me.

"Kotonoha is a friend of mine," I replied matter-of-factly. "Is that a problem?"

"You should stay away from girls like her."

The atmosphere had grown cold and tense with Otome's monotone warning. Pin pricks of unease crept into my skin. Had she always been this hostile toward Kotonoha? The scenario sounded familiar, but I couldn't seem to remember, a problem that's been sticking to my skull like a nasty, pulsating parasite. For now I'll have to just tread lightly...

With a gunshot-like  ** _clang_** , the office door burst open, revealing a short, lavender haired girl with twin-tails that drooped from the back of her head. She wore the same sporting uniform as Otome, and she looked just as shocked as we did.

"S-sorry!" she yelped as she withdrew her hand from the door. "I didn't mean to slam it like that."

"Roka?" Otome frowned, perplexed. "What are you doing here? You should be back at practice."

"I could say the same for you," she countered. "Ashikaga decided to cut practice short since we were already absent a few players then you bolted off after I mentioned the foreign kid's incident."

A strangled, almost gag-like noise came from Otome while her face took on the color of tomato juice. Her eyes glinted like daggers at Roka before she turned to me.

"I-I was just surprised by the news, that's all," she burned with a guilty smile. "I just couldn't believe I'd gone so long without hearing about it, it's not like I was worried or anything."

She seemed so flustered and heated that I swore I could see steam vent from her face. One word floated about the back of my skull: adorable. I fought to tear my leery gaze from the fidgety Otome as I focused back on the newcomer.

"This is Kitsuregawa Roka," stated Otome's mumbled introduction. "She's on my basketball team."

"Did you say Ashikaga?" I inquired to the new girl. "As in Ashikaga Yuuki?"

"Y-Yuuki?" she stammered with wide gems of cobalt that glittered with a hidden resentment. "No, our team captain is his older sister, Ashikaga Chie. It's a girls' basketball team, no boys."

"That wouldn't be enough to stop him," I muttered darkly under my breath.

"What was that?"

"Heh, nothing," I dismissed.  _I need to control myself._  "But I had no idea he had an older sister."

"Oh yeah, and you would never guess they were related just by looking," she smirked. "I'd say she's probably manlier than he is."

That nipped at a couple of my protective switches. "He's a good kid," I defended lightly. "I'm sure he gets enough of that kind of stuff from the other guys in school. Living in his shoes, I would've snapped from the teasing long ago."

"O-of course, sorry," Roka muttered, fixed on the ground. "I'm guessing you're a friend of his?"

"Something of the sort," I shrugged. "We became acquainted on my first day here. I could've sworn I'd heard your name before... Aren't you his friend as well?"

"No, not really," she sighed as she turned away sheepishly. "We kind of had a bad run-in once... Then his sister tried to introduce us to each other and it didn't go so well..."

"Mmm, I'm sorry your history isn't the best," I smiled understandingly. "If you're ever feeling up to it, you should try to make up with him. I don't mean to push you or tell you what to do, but he's an interesting kid. Plus he's in desperate need of a good friend, someone from around here anyway."

The bashful Roka only blushed and nodded in return. Awesome, I've personally meddled in more lives than any person my age ought to.  _Remember, they're fictional. It's not that big of a deal. Still…_

The chemistry between her and Yuuki was not unfamiliar to me. I remember reading of the rather embarrassing events that had transpired and placed an undeniable blemish on their relationship. It would inevitably fix itself, but I needed to speed it up. At the moment, Yuuki is still distantly fixated on Kotonoha, but I'm going to need her to stay with Makoto if I plan on personally taking Sekai out of the equation. It's not that Yuuki had a chance with her to begin with though, and I don't mean that to be harsh, but Kotonoha does eventually turn the kid down. Sort of. Too many things I prefer not to recount.

Besides, I liked the kid. He kind of reminds me of myself, a bolder and more height deficient version of myself. If I can help him achieve some kind of happiness from this mess, then that's a bonus I'm willing to take credit for. But not outside my inner monologue. Besides, he's helping me, it's the least I can do.

"I have to hurry off to go eat out with some friends," Otome announced as the three of us exited out into the empty hall. "I'll see you guys later. Don't go passing out on any roofs without me knowing, Rupert."

She skipped backwards a few steps, giggling with a taunting grin before turning to jog hastily down the hall. The girl had vanished before I could retort with anything foul, leaving me alone with my newly found character.  _Looks like I'm heading home alone today. No club activities for me.Then again..._  I turned to Roka to make my brief farewell.

"Hey, about Yuuki," Roka said quietly before I could utter a word.

My spine curved in slight disappointment. "Yes?" I replied, hiding my longing to head home.

"One of the reasons we don't really get along is because we sort of had a fight after I made fun of the way he looked..."

"So that's how it is," I nodded with understanding.

"B-but, I really do want to be friends with him," she stuttered desperately.

"I'm glad you want to make amends," I nodded again. "But why are you telling me?"

"Since you're a friend of his, I... I was wondering if you could maybe speak to him for me... Tell him I'm s-..." her mouth scrambled up in slight frustration, as though the word had lodged in her throat. "S-sorry. I'm sorry for the cruel things I said to him. I've been hoping to talk him myself, but I think he's avoiding me."

I pretended to look the shorter girl over and put on a face of serious contemplation. She stared back with worried, anticipating eyes. I almost felt sorry for the torture. Of course I was going to help her, I owed it to Yuuki, but that didn't mean I couldn't have my fun. When did I become so teasing?

"Alright, as long as you're genuinely sorry, I'll talk to him for you," I smiled cheaply. One good deed after another. Yay me.

Roka's eyes lit up and her mouth curved in elated relief. "Thank you so much! Let him know I want to talk to him myself as well. I could never say these things to his face."

"But I'm going to need one thing from you in return," I added mysteriously.

Her grin faded a shade but the joy continued to float around in her eyes. "Of course, anything."

"Can you tell me where they hold the student council meetings?"

* * *

I don't really know why I wanted to meet up with Kotonoha. It's not like I had anything to meddle with on her end, what with Sekai having forced me to leave her with Makoto. Maybe I just longed for the company. Regardless, I soon found myself standing in a deserted hall outside of a nameless room. I had begun to doubt Roka's directions until an explosion of angry-sounding discussions within gripped my attention. I had no idea student council could sound so harsh, though I failed to discern a single word.

Apparently, classes had ended a little less than two hours ago, so I prayed that the meeting would soon find closure. Given that I blacked out around lunch time, I have been out of commission for nearly five hours. Despite all this sleep, my fatigued body refused to feel any more refreshed. I'm surprised they didn't send me to the hospital. In fact, wouldn't that be the go-to solution for an event such as this? Hmph, anime logic.

I slouched against the wall, settling a few feet down from the door in hopes of not drawing too much attention when the room dispersed. Shouldn't Makoto be here? Given how desperate he was to elope with Kotonoha, he could spare an hour or two at school to wait for her. At least I would. As a gentleman, that is. Then again, Kotonoha likely would have insisted on not waiting up for her.

A few minutes of dead silence passed by, eventually giving way to the click of a doorknob and the cry of a few noisy hinges.

A handful of kids streamed out from the room, with only one or two sparing me even the most fleeting of glances. They all appeared so intense and marched with such straight stances. Back home, student council was nothing more than a joke that made kids feel like they had power in their school. Over here, it looked like actual work. Who would do that to themselves? I kept my eyes downturned, hoping nobody would recognize me as the new kid.

"Hudson?"

_So much for that._ I shot my eyes back up to find an unexpected sight.

"Kiyoura?" I blurted before realizing that many of the kids could still hear me. I ignored their suspecting eyes. "What are you doing here?"

Her crimson eyes replied with a sardonic look. "I'm on the student council of course. I should be asking you why you're standing out here eavesdropping."

"Ha ha," I smirked. "I'm just waiting on someone, that's all. In fact..."

I peered around the girl to scout out the meeting room. "Is Kotonoha still in there? I didn't notice her leave."

"You should stay away from her."

Kiyoura's face had shifted the slightest shadow darker. I looked at her in disbelief and backed up a step. How many people were planning on telling me to stay away from Kotonoha? I'm the one that should be telling them that, I'm the one who knows what she's capable of. They haven't the slightest clue what tragedies I've seen spawn from their world.

"Are you trying to intimidate me?" I asked irritably, my voice coming out shaken. "I'm getting a little tired of people around here telling me who to talk to and who to avoid,"

"I'm looking out for Sekai." Kiyoura's blank face remained unchanged. "Why are you here for that girl? She already has a boyfriend. Is it because you like her?"

"W-what kind of a question is that?" I grumbled, my mood steadily dropping. "Not that it's any of your business, but no, we're just friends."

"Mmm," she droned unconvinced.

The small girl took a last peek into the room behind her before releasing her hold on the door. It shut with a cold clink. "I hope you know what you're doing," she said quietly. The growl of thunder boomed in the distance.

"I hope so too," I replied in a raspy whisper.

"For Sekai's sake."

She eyed me with a final robotic analysis before turning and marching down the hall. I watched her back with a disquieted stare, wishing for her to not turn around. Her smart footsteps clacked off the walls long after she had turned out of sight. I dwelled on her words, sharing in her concern for Sekai.

Then I remembered Kotonoha. I poked into the room, spotting only a lonely girl shuffling a stack of papers. Despite her miserable-looking position, her face reflected a strangely cheerful color.

"Hey, Kotonoha," I called across the room before letting the door fall in behind me.

A bundle of loose papers fluttered away from Kotonoha's grasp when her eyes climbed to meet me. Only a synthetic glow from the few working light bars illuminated the classroom. I saw it as more of a glorified closet rather than an actual classroom. It clearly wasn't used for much other than storage and meetings. The few wall spaces that weren't obscured by stacked chairs were coated in note-ridden bulletin boards. The desks in the room had been sifted into a rough semi-circle, surrounding an old podium.

"H-Hu-Rupert?" she squeaked with a start, like a cute mouse startled by the sudden appearance a cheese wheel.  _Just friends._  "You're awake. Thank goodness."

"I guess everyone really has heard," I laughed as I rubbed the back of my neck. I strode across the room and bent down to help pick up the rebellious papers. They carpeted the entire area around her feet like a crinkly blanket of snow, and I couldn't read a single thing. Why did she have so many?

"Thank you," she smiled as we finished cleaning up. "But really, I'm so glad you're okay. What did you come here for?"

I had difficulty keeping my gratitude for her concern from burning my face. "I remember you said something about having a meeting today," I shrugged. "Just so happens I woke up around the time it ended. I could hear some pretty fiery voices in there; I never knew school meetings could get people so worked up."

"They're rarely like that," Kotonoha sighed as she shuffled the papers into a large binder. "Today's meeting actually shifted focus to your, um, incident."

"Ahh," I groaned with twitching eyebrows. "I'm not expelled am I?"

She snickered with a hand to her mouth at my worried expression.

"No no, we don't have the power to do something like that," she assured. "But, they were discussing the permanent restriction of the roof's access by taking away certain club privileges."

"That's not too bad," I whooshed my relieved reply. "I can always eat somewhere else."

"Well you won't have to worry about that," she smiled subtly before looking away. "The reason they became so loud was because I defended you and Sekai. They're, uh, not used to me speaking up."

"Really?" I voiced with bewildered concern. _Did she partake in that yelling?_  "You didn't have to go through that kind of trouble for us. They didn't-"

"You and Sekai are my friends," wisped her withered response. "And Makoto... I want us to have lunch together up there more often."

When she mentioned Sekai, my neck prickled. I still had no idea how I planned to confront her later about becoming a couple. Do I just ask her out? What a baffling conversation that would be.  _Hey, Sekai, I know you may have forced your tongue into my mouth earlier, but may I have the pleasure of asking you to be my girlfriend?_  Dammit, if she liked me so much why didn't she just tell me sooner? I worked hard on these plans and she dashed them to the wind. Maybe she really is toying with me? I could just be a big joke to her, some kind of life-sized toy. Maybe every one of them is a sick, sadistic-

"Rupert?" Kotonoha peeped with interest.

"So you actually argued for us?" I asked after tearing from my thoughts. "I can't even begin to imagine what you look like when you're mad."  _I don't need to._

"It was no big deal. I just stated that the entire scene had been an accident that could not have been prevented," she stated with a satisfied glint. "It was within Sekai's right to use her club key to access the roof. Unless any nefarious acts could be proven to have taken place at the time, then nothing needs to be done."

"Heh, nefarious," I muttered with a slacked grin and downturned eyes.

Kotonoha nodded, failing to detect my guilty conscience. "Thankfully, Kiyoura backed up my opinion, so it ended rather swiftly after that. If not for her, I don't know how it would have gone."

"Kiyoura?" I piped with astonishment.

Kotonoha nodded. She held the binder of papers under her arm and signaled her will to leave. "Yes, she's one of the class representatives. She has an exceptional volume of influence over the rest of the council. She's also a close friend of Sekai's. You may have seen her leave the room, the girl with the large red bow."

I scuffed along to the door and pried it open for her. More thunder roared, followed by the subtle encore of rain. "Now that you mention it, I think I did see someone like that…"

* * *

Before school, the sun had shone so bright and the sky had seemed so blue. Now it was as though I had forgotten my glasses. We couldn't see more than two feet in front of ourselves through the heavy wall of slapping rain. At least it fell straight, allowing Kotonoha's umbrella to provide some coverage. She always kept one in her locker in case of emergency. I could actually feel the rain push down, straining my weak arm.

"I hope you don't mind me asking," I spoke loudly as the two of us splashed cautiously down the final street home; we were forced to nearly yell over the hammering downpour. It took until now for an opportunity to speak to present itself. Between the racks of thunder, Kotonoha could go on forever about student council. And apparently she was prolific in martial arts. "How's it been going between you and Makoto?"

For a moment I thought she was about to slip on the puddles in the sidewalk. "Oh, um, we've been… good. He's been a bit busy lately with homework, but he's always thinking about me."

Her faltering voice lacked any real conviction. My stomach churned. My knuckled grew white on the umbrella handle. "I see. I'm sorry I asked you something so personal, but I've just been kinda curious. Relationships are an interesting field that I've been looking into. Such territory remains undiscovered to me."

"I-It's fine," she waved with cheery eyes. Too cheery. Spattered raindrops looked like tears on her cheeks. "Hey, have you heard about what my class is doing for the festival?"

Kotonoha's uppity inflection carried off into the storm, mentally leaving me behind. Makoto has been neglecting her, that much was clear. Didn't they  _just_  start dating? The blame may not belong entirely to him though. The unmistakable wrenching of my gut reminded me that I was at fault.

I had put it in his head to chase after Sekai right from the get go. Whatever doubts he had about my words, with Kotonoha being so difficult for him, it would all be sinking in now. My whole plan to make Makoto jealous may be working too well, beyond remaining useful. I've been developing a knack for getting in my own way.

With a deep breath, I glanced out from beneath the plastic shield that warded off the wrath of the clouds. I loved this type of weather; it usually cheered me up more than any warmth of sunlight ever could. But today…

"What do you think about your class's activity?"

Kotonoha's voice ricocheted off my ear canal. I flinched sideways and managed to soak my right sleeve. She had leaned in to shout directly into my ear. Actually, she hadn't leaned at all, we were just squeezed that tightly under the umbrella.

"S-sorry," she gasped. "I didn't mean to surprise you."

"It's all fine," I laughed while I shook my right arm of excess moisture. "Uh, my class? I don't really know what we're doing."

"Like I said," she giggled. "Your class is doing a little maid café. You'll be cooking and serving guests with some simple fried food and drink. Think you can manage that?"

"I've never been one for cooking," I snickered with a shrug. "Maybe it will be a good learning experience. But do we get to enjoy the festival?"

"Your class will assign shifts," she reassured. "When you're done you should be free to do as you please. Most activities close by some point for the final event."

"Ah, good. Maybe we can hang out together and see the rest of the acts. The four of us I mean." I could just barely make out the door of my home through the rainy sheet.

"That sounds like a great idea," she spoke in a voice I could just make out.

"I hate to leave you to walk alone in the rain," I frowned as she loomed on the sidewalk. "Are you positive you don't want me to walk with you?"

"I'm fine," she laughed once more as she shook the black parasol. "I don't want you to have to walk all the way back without cover. Don't worry about it."

I nodded and waved a soggy hand. "Have a good weekend, Kotonoha. If you need anything, I'm just a text away."

"You too, Rupert," she beamed. "And I'll keep that in mind."

I watched her back fade out into the blur before softly closing the front door. The house was dark and silent, aside from the muffled drum of the storm outside. With the dulling of the rain, I could finally make out the pounding in my own head. I grimaced as a sharp pain stabbed at my forehead. I massaged the tender spot that I believed took the brunt of my fall. As I shook the wetness from my coat, the blare of my cell phone shrieked from my pocket.  _A text message?_

I reached a hand down to retrieve the damp piece of plastic and flipped the little clam shell open. My eyes widened at the name of the sender. The message read:

\- Makoto Itou

**\- Hey, we need to talk.**

It was going to be a unique weekend.

 


	10. Tiny Brittle Bridges

"Goodbye"

An unforgiving drum pounded through the girl's small frame and a surge of jealous blood dyed her vision a fiery red. A silver blade plunged and scraped over and over from a crumpled form, the focus of her passionate rage, deprived of any drop of mercy. A familiar name puled to the world with a final breath, the feathery hammer that shattered her trance faster than it started. Her dark eyes widened at the drenched hand that reached for her, wrenching forth a gasp from her small neck faster than a shock of icy water. The scarlet grasp fell away, never to feel again.

Then a piercing screech sliced through the still air, shriller than the song of any siren fable. The world retreated.

"I made out with a murderer!" I nearly screamed as I jerked my head from my propped elbow. A small packet of silverware jingled to the ground and a few curious patrons sent over furtive glances. Most of the café's residents failed to notice through the haze of chatter and kitchen banter, and the few that did renewed their interest elsewhere. I wiped at the gush of sweat shining my brow.

"What was that?"

Makoto Itou stood apologetically at the other end of the table, his hand planted upon the back of a recently-dragged chair. He pulled the seat out a few more cautious inches, the gritty tile spewing out a pathetic squeak before the boy sat down. In place of the typical coat and tie, he wore a faded-green collared shirt and jeans.

"N-nothing, just a bad dream," I replied, swiping an unattractive slick of drool from my cheek. I can only hope that a heart attack finally takes me in my sleep before these nightmares manifest into reality.

"Sorry, I wasn't expecting it to scrape the floor like that," he laughed while he did a jig in his seat to make himself comfortable. “Shouldn’t you be getting more sleep?”

"Don't worry about it, I don’t plan on any more blackouts," I said with a grin. Thanks to the weekend, I managed to sleep in a whole ten minutes. Go me.

“But then, they’re not exactly planned, are they?” I chuckled at my own lame joke. “I'm just glad you chose such a public place to meet after sending such an ominous text message."

"Ominous?" he blinked before cracking a cheesy smile. "I didn't mean it to sound like that, though I do have some important things to discuss-"

"One coffee with cream!" cried a waitress with large bouncy hair loops. She held out a tray and placed a steaming white mug down before me without spilling a drop, though the way it wobbled spoke a tale of pure luck. The waitress smiled too widely to not seem suspicious.

"Thank you, Kuroda," I nodded politely, hoping for the loud girl to leave as soon as possible.

"This is who you've been waiting for?” she chimed. I inwardly groaned to the heavens.

“You know, we usually only have couples here," she peered with a sly grin. She leaned over the table. "I didn't know you two were such good friends. You should be careful who you become acquainted with, Hudson. Too bad you missed the entrance ceremony, then you would’ve had a better look at everyone. This guy won't even admit that Sekai is his girlfriend. Could this be an affair?"

"It's because she isn't my girlfriend," Makoto replied with a tired face. "And I'm just going to have a slice of the cake from the display and a glass of water."

"Hmph," Kuroda puffed as she wrote the order down. Did she really need to take the time to write down two things? She gave me an eye roll that blared ‘told you so’ before curtly spinning her waitress dress and walking off.

"She did bring up something of concern to me," Makoto said after Kuroda was out of earshot.

I took an aloof sip of my coffee before nearly spitting it back out after searing my tongue. Blech, I’m not one for bitter beverages. I only ordered something out of obligation and this happened to be the tiniest number on the menu. I wish they had pictures so I didn’t have to point words out like an idiot. Then again, I guess most restaurants don’t put pictures of their beverages in their menus.

"Strange coincidence that you chose this café of all places," I said after a painful gulp, trying to hold off the subject as long as possible. I had a hunch about the reason behind this meeting. A dreadful, assuredly dead-on hunch.

Makoto looked up with a slight mixture of confusion."Why's that?"

"I just came here the other day with another friend of mine. Do you know Ashikaga Yuuki? Brown hair, glasses, kinda short. Really short."

“Hmm, I think there’s an Ashikaga on the girls’ basketball team, but I’m not really familiar with her. Why?”

“Ah, I think that’s his sister. Yuuki’s her younger brother, and I met him in this very café on my first day of school.”

“I see…” he replied half-heartedly.

I tapped away on the ebbing warmth of my cup while he stared out the window, the awkward silence plucking away at us. I never have been one to keep up senseless small talk, and I could tell from his darting pupils that Makoto was readying himself for a difficult topic.

“I-I wanted to talk to you about something,” he began.

“That girl sure is taking her time with just a slice of cake-“

"About you and Sekai," he said finally as his finger scrawled an invisible doodle on the table. "Um, how are you two doing?"

I pushed the pain of my fried tongue to the back of my mind and steepled my fingers like a manager before an interviewee. "It's, er, complicated, to put it lightly," I said, sounding the part. 

I glanced out into the street. We painted a misinformative picture, the two of us. A couple of school kids sitting at a small table in an aesthetically loud, romance-themed café, consciously avoiding each other's gaze would make anyone feel suspicious. I suppressed a gag that caught in my throat.

"You could say there’s a sort of culture gap we’re struggling with, I suppose. On another note, let me just say that you and Kotonoha are a perfect match,” I said with smarmy grin and a slow nod.

Makoto’s gaze deflated and a heavy cloud seemed to float in and cling to him. My skin prickled and my attempt at convincing myself into confidence ebbed away, smudging my smug mask into nonexistence.

“So, uh, why the interest in my unorthodox love life?"

“I need… I need to know for sure…” Makoto’s appearance had grown darker and distant. The struggle in his voice translated through the scrunched look of concentration on his face. “Do you truly care for her? Do you- do you love her?”

That was a rather demanding question to put upon a man in a relationship fresher than the first daisy blossom of spring. Funny thing is, I can’t even truthfully say that Sekai and I are even dating. I still need to talk to her.

“O-of course, well I mean, I care for her,” I said quietly. “I definitely don’t feel any discontent with her.” That might have been a lie.

“But do you love her?” Makoto had actually jerked forward to the edge of his seat. His breathing had picked up in rhythm. To the horror of my sensitive nostrils, I could smell his minty toothpaste, so I combated his advancement by sitting back in my stiff chair with a disbelieving quirk in one cheek, squinting one eye. 

“That’s kind of a heavy question there, isn’t it?” I replied with a scratch of my temple. “I mean I’ve only just started getting to know her. What’s with the third degree?”

The boy slouched back and spewed out a long breath through the crack of his mouth. “Kotonoha talks about you,” he said.

My seat creaked as I sat straighter at the mention of the boy’s quiet girlfriend. “What’s that got to do-“

“Everything,” he said immediately. “Nearly every word from her has to do with you, even her texts. She’s always talking about how you’ve helped her and how grateful she is. Even when I try to change the subject, it ends up back on you, and I don’t even think she notices.”

Truth be told, I was still feeling pretty impressed with myself for talking down that thug from bullying Kotonoha and avoiding the intimate combination of the pavement with my insides. That whole scenario never should have worked out so well.

But, acts of valor aside, Makoto was going in the exact direction I feared. He was searching out excuses to justify his impatience. I could feel it already, the inevitable doom of it all, like nothing could have been prevented in the first place. It was the same inescapable feeling of running in a dream and going nowhere.

“You’re putting too much thought into this,” I said while I vented my shirt with a tug of my collar. It was too hot for this shirt, even without the coat and tie. “So I helped her out a few times, big deal. It’s what friends do, isn’t it? You’re one of the first people to show her kindness, she loves you.” To a very destructive degree, but details are unimportant.

“You don’t understand. I just… it’s the way she talks about you, how her face lights up. She talks more than I’ve ever seen when it’s about you,” he said with a faraway breath. “No matter how hard I try, I can’t get her to look at me like that. I think I made a mistake.”

“What are you talking about? You love Kotonoha, don’t you? You’ve watched her for so long... A-as Sekai confided in me,” I said quickly. “If your feelings were ever genuine then you’ll fight for her attention. Though I do believe you’re overreacting.”  
“I don’t know… It's so frustrating. I think I need to break up with her.”

It’s like he isn’t even listening to me. The twitchy commander at the reigns of my brain was dangerously close to throwing a sweaty fist at the panic button. Only the last dribbles of my will clasped my nerves in place. None of this could possibly justify him straying from Kotonoha so quickly. Every time I think I’m getting this all together, another hiccup comes along and botches the whole mess! Three steps back, every time. Every. Time.

“Woah, okay, let’s just back up a bit there. You guys have only been together for, what, a day or two? It’s a bit soon to be throwing in the towel don’t you think?”

“I have limits,” the boy stated with a tired, unconvincing sigh that tightened my burning fist. Where did this guy learn to push buttons so well? “And I can tell she’s no longer interested in me.”

“Limits? What are you expecting after a couple dates? These things need time to develop, you need to get to know each other. You need patience,” I said with a quiet severity. “If you let it end this quickly and prematurely, how do you expect another relationship to go?”

“I won’t make the same mistake. I plan on asking out a girl who I know feels the same for me,” he said bluntly. “Why don’t we swap girlfriends?”

My stomach dropped. I stared with a crooked brow at the creature that had just sputtered such an astonishing sentence. Makoto looked back with stern conviction, something I had yet to see on his pathetic face. He was completely serious. He was deliberately asking me to go against everything I had come up with, and he was willing to treat these girls like trading cards. Sparks flicked between my teeth.

“Heh, you-, I mean, what are you saying?” I said with a dry laugh through a locked grin, trying to unhear everything. I could feel my defenses clambering into formation, ready to bite back at a second’s notice.

“I’m serious,” he continued with a flat tone. “If you truly care for Sekai, you’ll let her go so that she can be with me, someone she actually loves. And you get Kotonoha.”  
A painful pop in my neck flagged the final breach of my patience. 

Someone she actually loves? What the hell does he know about that? And the way he mentioned Kotonoha like some kind of afterthought... All this guy cares about is sexing up anything in a skirt and then walking away to throw his libido at another unfortunate victim. What does he know about judging how other people feel? He’s been a dense, insensitive, infantile, damned imbecile since the start! 

My jaw tightened and my teeth continued to suffer. A fog of condensation blanketed my glasses.

How dare he.

"How dare you,” I spat, blood gushing into my frowning cheeks. A shudder ran through my bones as I struggled over my composure. Calm. Stay calm. “After all the trouble you went through just to achieve the slightest chance with this beautiful girl, you’re going to throw her away like child bored with his doll. And to top it off, you want to convince me to tear away from my relationship, just to be with someone you believe will grant you with more immediate relief. To think I was hoping to make friends with you.”

“Wh-”

"No!" I hissed.

I shifted directly to my feet before he had a chance to spout any more garbage, scratching my chair back a few clamoring inches. There was nothing left that I cared to hear from this conversation. My sight locked with his dull, swampy eyes, spread with surprise and frustration. He never did change, did he? He was always the same from the start: a complete jackass.

“I’m done listening to your senseless dribble,” I said, keeping a tame tongue. I reached into my pocket and dragged out the money I had planned on counting for the coffee. Without a second thought, I slammed the handful of bills and coins on the table. I did not care to remember the price of the meal or the value of the money.

“When we return to school, I am completely willing to forget that this nauseating exchange ever took place. But if I find out that you’ve hurt Kotonoha, I can assure you that you won't get the chance to do it to anyone else.” With a jerky spin, I turned to the exit, my arms rigid and trembling. 

I don't really know how I would backup my threats, but I refused to allow myself to think about it. My heart threatened to evacuate my chest and my vision had degraded into a heated haze. The journey to the door was a numb one as I ignored the strange looks that surrounded me. The only thing I regretted as I made my exit was that in my haste, I failed to apologize to the wide-eyed Kuroda, whom I had nearly knocked a tray from.

 

“I can’t believe it fell apart so quickly. You just stormed out?” Yuuki’s voice was threaded with disbelief, but his mouth stretched in an impish grin. “He did have it coming, but are you sure you don’t have anger problems?”

We sat across from each other in the midst of Yuuki's classroom. Along with a few other students from his class, the boy had come to school over the weekend to help speed along the creation of the class's festival event, whatever it was. I hadn’t bothered asking about their project, preferring to fume in disgruntled peace. In fact, the whole journey to the school had failed to register in my memory.

“When I was a child, I could throw one hell of a tantrum, sure,” I said to the window. “It’s been a long while since I lost my temper in such a volatile manner.”

“Volatile? I wouldn’t go that far,” Yuuki laughed. “It’s not like you punched him or anything. You just raised your voice a little. If that."

My only reply was an indecipherable murmur. I felt a tinge of guilt over the fact that I had called Yuuki with the notion of hanging out, only to sit here in a smothered mood, recounting my unfortunate encounter at the café. I had left the story mostly vague, for fear of reigniting my anger, but I got across the gist of Makoto being an ass about the girls. It barely even registered the fact that days had past since Yuuki and I had last spoken.

“You’ve had an exciting few days, haven’t you?” the boy said as he pulled himself from his work. “First you’re the talk of the school after fainting in a restricted area, with a girl, and now you’re calling Itou out in the middle of public. Imagine what you’ll accomplish during the festival.”

“Don’t,” I sighed. “Please, do not remind me of that. My ulcers will thank you."

“Ha ha, sorry," Yuuki said. "Don't you think you're overreacting about the festival? It’ll be fun! With all the hard work going into it, I can’t imagine anyone having a bad time. Who doesn’t love fried food?”

"You would think that, but the dying ocean Makoto’s ship sails upon conceals a horde of short-fused kraken,” I said as I tapped an uneasy marker against the desk. “Fried food will be far from anyone’s mind with all the hormones in the air. Unfortunately for us, we have to ensure nothing runs off the rails during this whole thing. Kotonoha’s well-being should be our top priority.”

“Yes, of course,” Yuuki said, a sternness seeping into his eyes. “This could actually be a prime opportunity to ensure that Makoto finally leaves her alone.” He had no idea why I prefered to emphasize her stability, and it needed to stay that way. 

I threw the boy a confused frown at the strange statement that ran completely opposite of my plan. Of course, I quickly realized that without telling him about Sekai, we would end up working in contradicting directions. I guess the time to tell him had finally dawned. Hopefully Yuuki takes Kotonoha’s fate well.

“Okay so... I need to inform you on a change I’ve come up with,” I said, sucking in a deep breath. “I know we both agreed that Kotonoha shouldn’t be with him, but I kind of made the decision that, for the better of her mental well-being, their relationship shouldn’t be tampered with.” 

It almost failed to register just how detached from humanity I sounded with the trivial way I discussed the manipulation of people’s personal lives. It reminded me of moving chess pieces, and my grade-schooler cousin wipes the board with me every time. If we think too hard about the moral issues, we might as well just jump off the roof now.

Yuuki’s pupils shrank. “What? But we can’t leave Makoto to take advantage of a someone like her. Why the change? What about Saionji?”

Even with all the trash Makoto has forced me to wade through, he didn’t deserve to die for it. Beaten into a bloody pulp maybe, but I’ve seen him as a good, relatable person. If he stays faithful to Kotonoha, maybe we’ll all witness it. 

“Listen, I know he’s not exactly a chivalrous prince, but I believe Kotonoha can take care of herself. She’s mature enough to know what she wants.” Hah. In reality I’m just praying that by removing every other outside force, nothing bloody occurs while I’m here. As long as I can keep someone from a grisly death, this can all go to the dogs once I’m gone for all I care. Well, maybe I cared a little.

“Are you sure? She can barely handle using her library card on the checkout machine.” 

“I am one hundred percent positive.” Not. ”And we don’t even have to worry about Saionji causing trouble.”

The boy looked at me with an annoyed intrigue. I could feel that my matter-of-fact attitude was grating on him. “Why’s that?”

I mustered up a deep breath and held it for a few thought provoking seconds before wheeshing it out. 

“I sort of.. let’s say I’ve got her “distracted”. Distracted to the point that she will no longer hound after Makoto.”

“Exactly what kind of distraction is this?” Yuuki continued, his haze of suspicion practically condensing itself around him.

“Well, it’s a very human sort of distraction. Of the relationship variety. The romance kind.” 

Yuuki remained stoic for a few moments, digesting the less than subtle hints I had thrown his way, before his eyebrows gradually climbed the slant of his face. “You’re not…”

“I am the distraction.”

“You and..?”

“Yeah.”

“But-”

“Look,” I said, attempting to prevent a possible meltdown. “I know it was a pretty bold move on my part, but in my defense, she came on to me first.”

“She came on to you?” Yuuki said with a wary frown.

“It was more like she ambushed my face with her mouth, but I’m certain she won’t be a problem anymore. Well, not for Makoto, anyway. I may have left out the part in my conversation with Makoto where he wanted me to leave Sekai for him. That also may have struck a touchy chord with me.”

“Geez,” Yuuki sighed in subdued shock. “It just keeps getting worse. I can’t really say I envy you, but I guess this helps solidify our plans…” He turned away and stared at the lit flecks of dust floating about by the windows. “So we’re really gonna leave Kotonoha with Makoto, huh?”

“That’s the best route I can see, given the circumstances.”

The glimmer of sadness that Yuuki tucked away behind his glasses at the mention of Katsura did not go unnoticed. If the situation were different, sure, I’d do everything in my power to help the kid win her over, or at least give him some kind of chance with her. But the stars were in too much disarray as it was. Luckily, I had some news that would effortlessly expunge the silly crush from Yuuki’s mind.

“You know, I just remembered that Kitsuregawa wanted me to talk to you for her.”

Yuuki’s bent demeanor snapped up so quickly that I feared for the poor guy’s spine. “K-Kitsuregawa? What does she want?” He tried to hide his intrigue behind a wall of frowns.

“She told me to tell you to find her so she could tell you something,” I somewhat lied.

“Huh? That’s… indirect. Why didn’t she just come tell me?”

“I dunno,” I shrugged in pure innocence. “She mumbled about being sorry for something or another and wanting to go to the festival. I could barely understand the girl, so she just asked me if I could get you to confront her.”

While it wasn’t the truth, I had decided that it would be better if Roka apologized to Yuuki face-to-face, which would optimally lead to an invitation to a romantic evening at the festival. With Yuuki preoccupied, I’ll be forced to overwatch Makoto and Kotonoha throughout the event on my own, but I felt that simplified things. Success should leave the rest of the year as smooth sailing, if my garbage logic holds. Hopefully I will have found a way home before it’s tested further.  
“She… She said that? Are you sure?”  
“As sure as the Earth’s round,” I replied as my thoughts drifted to the idea that this Earth could, in fact, retain an entirely foreign shape.  

“Huh, I don’t know. Uh, I guess I need to get a hold of my sister. She should know how to contact her. Plus I should probably cancel my game tonight…”

I watched with a satisfied grin as Yuuki’s head began to shudder and leak steam over what should be a simple encounter. I was a little jealous of his naivety. “Exactly what game are you canceling?”

“Huh? he said, popping out of his thought process. “Oh, uh have you heard of Brightstar Phantasia Online?”

A quick check through my mental library turned up negative. “No, can’t say I have. Sounds like an MMO.”

“Yes, it is. I was planning on playing with a few friends later, but I think I’ll put that off for now. I’ll have to text them.”

“Excellent choice,” I smirked as reached into my pocket for my own phone. The hours had dissipated with little notice, and I still wanted to get one thing done before the day’s end. Now that my mood had somewhat improved, there was someone I needed to speak with to bring it crashing back down. 

 

The sun yawned in the sky and dipped low, staining the clouds a deep violet upon a scarlet canvas. The station lights buzzed above the subtle murmurs of the platform’s sparse crowd. From my solitary seat on a cold bench, my leg bounced violently in stark contrast to the soothing atmosphere as I churned through thought after thought, trying to think up what to say without sounding like a simpleton. I knew the probability of my backbone liquefying into mush the moment we began speaking stood exceedingly high.

I had finally scraped up the gumption to text Sekai with my intention to sit down and talk over our positions on this mess. Her reply barely qualified as a sentence, but she agreed, and she chose Haramihama’s station as our meet up, the station I tackled on the way to school every morning. As I waited, the moment on the roof replayed on the screens of my eyelids over and over, burned into my memory like an image on an old CRT. 

I pressed my knuckles into my eyes, rubbing the scene away, but it continued to rewind and repeat. The warmth of her face, the fleshy pillow of her lips. Her smile after I complimented her cooking. Nope. NOPE. Not gonna dwell on that, need to focus on the problem at hand… But my face continued to burn, puffs of steam leaking from my shirt and warming my neck.

“Rupert?”

It did not matter for how long I expected to hear her voice. The instant Sekai’s soft call weeded through the feathery brush of the platform’s ambience, my skin nearly jumped from my frame.

“Hey, Sekai,” I said quietly as I faced her. She wore a striped pink blouse and a lavender skirt beneath a snug chocolate coat. I creeked up off the bench. “You, uh, look nice.”

“Eh?” she gasped, always unprepared for the casual compliment. “Thanks, I guess.”

The air between us sat thick with unease and uncertainty, reflected in Sekai’s face. I could only imagine how awkward she felt after our little rooftop escapade, but her persistence in willingly meeting me in person gave light to her determination.

“Do you mind if we walk?” I asked.

If there’s one benefit I’ve exposed myself to while bumbling about in this world, it’s exercise. We strolled down a hushed street peppered with privately owned shops and apartments, passing only a few silent pedestrians now and then. As the sky continued to darken, the shop lights began to dim, leaving only the streetlamps and the occasional window to warm the street. 

The minutes sloshed on. Not like my walks with Kotonoha. While those walks were often pleasantly quiet with snatches of dialogue, the inevitable discussion with Sekai dyed the current atmosphere with apprehension.

“I’m sorry.”

I nearly stopped when Sekai tore through the silence. Then I noticed she had actually stopped a few paces ago. Then I really stopped.

“What was that?” I asked as I skipped through the embarrassing gap between us.

“For… For kissing you. I’m sorry.” In the glow of a streetlamp, her dark hair gleamed at me as she faced the ground in sincere apology.

“It’s okay, Sekai,” I said calmly. “In all honesty, I didn’t hate it.”

Sekai’s deep violet eyes hovered up to meet my face, inspecting to prove the sincerity of my comment. “When I said you’ve been distracting me, I meant it. Ever since you vowed to help me, I began to question myself.”

Even though I already knew, the words still thumped at my heart. Why was it such a refreshing revelation to hear her say that? Maybe I’m just that desperate. Maybe I really have developed feelings for her. Maybe I’m reverting back into an angsty teen.

“I just, I don’t really know what to say,” I replied, the color bursting into my face. “Are you really sure you like me that way? I think you could be misinterpreting some other feeling, because really, I’m not worth anyone’s time, I mean I don’t even have any redeeming qualities. I’m just a boring, sarcastic--”

“Idiot! Stop saying that!” Sekai nearly yelled. “If I like you, then I like you! I know what I’m feeling without you trying to tell me.” She had stepped forward and butted her head into my chest, the warm impact rattling my body in place. She buried her face into my shirt and my collar began to grow taught at the back of my neck as her slender fingers curled up snatches of cloth.

I strained a swallow as I stood there hesitantly with a pretty girl huddling into my shirt. I thanked the barren streets of the night for the privacy while my emotions mixed and battled under my skin. This all felt too much like something I had secretly always wished for in my lonely life, but now that it was happening I had a difficult time functioning. 

“I like you,” came her mumbled voice.

My heart twisted and twirled until I finally decided to react. Maybe I do like her. I lifted my noodled arms up and snaked them around Sekai’s little back, satisfying myself with the comforting embrace. At my touch, her shoulders slouched and she drew closer.

With a subtle tilt, Sekai looked up into my face for a brief moment before stretching forward to gingerly place her lips upon mine. I invited the fuzzy blanking of my thoughts as I pressed back, savoring the kiss that lacked the others' force and exhaustion. 

Dammit. I’ll have to walk her back to the station now.


	11. Heavy Evening Air

I’ve always found the concept of time to be an enigmatic and frustrating piece of humanity to grasp. Before I suffered whatever it was that whisked my unsuspecting body away into this dramatic neverland of bloodshed, my days had been very brief experiences, and they grew briefer with every pass of the sun. With each morning the same monotonous routine: get up, refresh hygiene, eat, school, and then sleep the night away. Rinse and repeat. The element of adventure that once glazed my eyes with a sparkle had long died away with my childhood, the days that once dragged on without a hint of responsibility now flickered by, rich with stress and worry. School work, money, the future, it all piled on with no sign of letting up. Time eluded me.

Here, in this fictional mimicry of Japan, I relived that childish sense of adventure once again, coupled with a healthy dosage of fear and confusion. But perhaps that made it all the more exciting. It was a different kind of fear, a curious and stimulating fear, as opposed to crippling and depressing type. I imagine it’s not too dissimilar to the thrill experienced by explorers of the old world, hiking through tangles of jungle or stretches of desert for the sake of sheer discovery. The fear that flipped Bilbo Baggins from his introverted lifestyle. Still, even now, I could feel time returning to its distanced relationship, offering only a fleeting nod before running along and leaving me behind. The days grew shorter, but I was happy.

My first exhilarating week at Sakakino Academy eagerly departed into memory. I managed to pull through without a drop of spilled blood, the only price being a sliver of my sanity. The dissolution of the weekend brought on a series of refreshing revelations. Makoto and Kotonoha’s relationship seemed stable, though perhaps quieter, Yuuki was getting along with Kitsuregawa, and the upcoming festival looked to be a simple, culture educating treat the more I thought about it. The fact that it was tomorrow left me without a hint of grief. 

Makoto never once approached me about the verbal lashing I had doled out, and as far as I could tell from the few times we talked, we were on friendly terms once again. Maybe he actually was capable of seeing beyond the shallow lust that bordered his feeble thoughts. The mood during my daily walks with Kotonoha never faltered. I swore she shone brighter with every passing day.

With everyone sorted and friendly, the thought of a simple life in this world appeared more than just enticing; it seemed possible. I’ve even been letting Sekai help me out with my neglected schoolwork. Just in case. I would have to learn to read someday, electronic translators would only get me so far.

“Follow.”

“Huh?”

Classes had ended for the day and the halls were stretching at the seams with students as usual. The moment I had turned the corner for the library a pair of bright, crimson eyes flashed and blocked my way. The miniature form of Kiyoura Setsuna stood firm like a small, piercing statue, a startling determination in her stare. As soon as she gave her order she turned and marched down the hall without another word. It took my legs a moment’s hesitation to awake and sputter after her. I had wanted to go over tomorrow’s events with Yuuki, but we would probably be fine. 

I fought off the urge to ask the girl where we were headed, I doubted I would get a straight answer from her anyway. Vague images of a subtle plan to finally do away with my meddling hands did come to mind, but such ideas seemed farfetch’d now, like they would be back home. The stuff of daydreams. My life had zenned out, meddling wasn’t so necessary anymore. 

Kiyoura was content with our distance only after rounding another few corners. She stopped so suddenly I wondered if the soles of her shoes left a skidmark. We had reached a dark, uninhabited corner of the school. Kiyoura’s shadowed face sent my spine a few chilling racks, but she remained firm and collected. A lengthy pause ensued while she continued to remain stock still, staring at the corridor wall. Did it really pay to be so dramatic? I darted my gaze around in anticipation. No windows, just the dull gloss of the floor and a few silent rooms. Only the faint murmur of the departing students echoed through the building now. With a small flick of her foresty hair, the girl finally turned around.

“I’m going to be leaving soon,” she said quietly. Her lips barely moved but her eyes quivered with a concealed emotion. I scrunched up my face at the strange statement.

“Well I mean, that is what most of us are doing right now,” I said with a scratch at my temple. “You did hear the bell, right?”

“I’m leaving Japan,” she stated, unphased by my attempt at humor. My mouth jerked ajar in surprise. “I’ll be moving to France with my mother soon. Her career requires it.”

“O-oh,” I said in a deflated manner. My gaze strayed to the dull tile. “Look, I know we haven’t really been the best of pals, but I’m sorry you have to go. How’s Sekai feel about this?”

“I haven’t told her yet,” she said, her eyes turning away, downcast. “This is why I’ve come to you. I need to know that I’m leaving her with a clear conscience, that she’s with someone who will watch out for her.”

“Of course, yeah don’t worry,” I nodded. “She’s among friends. And I mean she’s pretty strong so-”

“No,” she interrupted. “I need to know that you will stay with her, as the person she cares about most. You haven’t seen. When her heart is tormented she will fall into the deepest depression, locking herself in her room for an entire day or more. It used to occur often, but then you came along… I was once the only one who could bring her out of it.”

Her words drifted off. Clearly she had been just as perplexed as I over Sekai’s attraction towards me. But must everything sound so theatrical? It kinda made it hard for me to realize just how serious this all was. I don’t know when i

“Soon I’ll be gone from her side and I need you to take my place. Will you dance with her at the festival’s bonfire?”

“Da-dance?” The images popped open their dusty covers and flickered to life like an old projector. The giant fire, the dark silhouettes swaying in its glow, and the betrayal. Betrayal… Shame overcame me with a shadowy shock as I remembered the promise I had made to Otome about going to the festival with her, and my stomach battered itself up against my rib cage. It was just to hang out, right? Totally casual, no need to beat myself up over it. I mean I still have to work for my class’s ridiculous cafe thingy, and I’m sure Sekai won't mind if a take off for a bit afterwards. Hell, Sekai wouldn’t mind if we all walked around as a group. That’s what these things are for, hanging out with friends.

Yuuki and I were also planning to watch over Kotonoha from the sidelines, but we’ve only vaguely talked about this stuff all week. Whenever I run into her she lights up like a firework, the happiest I’ve ever seen her. With Yuuki preoccupied over Kitsuregawa combined with Sekai leading me by the arm we’ve had our hands too full to really worry about other relationships, and Kotonoha’s cheery face made it all the easier to dismiss. We decided that the festival would be our final act of surveillance before swearing our noses out for good and declaring Makoto ‘clean’.

“Pff, I don’t know how to dance.” I said, brushing my worries back into the pit of my abdomen. Kiyoura’s frigid stare told the humorless tale of a no-nonsense girl who knew only the harsh upbringing of a jokeless world.

“Outside of class one. I’ve heard you and Ashikaga talk,” she said, her thin eyebrows creasing inward. “I know about how you both had plans to meddle with everyone, break up Makoto from Kotonoha and pair him with Sekai.” Her voice had dropped but its poison continued to drip. I widened my eyes at her and my mouth flopped, opening and closing with no words to compensate, my throat caught. My imitation of a dying trout had reached perfection.

“But,” she continued, her glare thawing. “Even I had considered interfering in order to get Sekai what she wanted. But now she has it. Things are good as they are. If I find out you’ve been anything but faithful to her, I will do everything in my power to seal your misery before I depart.” 

The concrete sincerity of Kiyoura’s threat almost stirred a nervous laugh from my paralyzed vocal chords. Her words broke over my head and coated me in a cascade of ice. It had never occurred to me just how loyal Kiyoura was, or how vulnerable Sekai could be. She appeared so blissful and hardened, but when I thought back on it, to certain moments like the seconds before she kissed me on the roof or the night she confessed to me, the apprehension she hid should have been an obvious sign. I hadn’t really planned on anything to the contrary, but now my loyalty found itself hardening into a steely alloy grip. It almost felt choking, like I was getting married. It’s silly to even think of backing out now, I committed long ago.

My thoughts rewound a few moments back. Kiyoura had overheard us? Had she been stalking Yuuki and I? I never caught the slightest glimpse of her during any of our discussions, and I consider myself more situationally aware than most. That eavesdropping little...

While I squirmed internally under my skin, my brain beating itself, stuttering and spitting smoke, Kiyoura’s footsteps had already faded into the distance, the teasing ends of her hair whipping around a corner and out of sight. The air felt colder. I’m beginning to forget how to properly end a conversation.

 

“How is it that I’m only now being told this festival is two days long?”

My arms, which were only moments ago a blur as they powered a whisk through a bowl of cake batter, had already begun to feel the numb unresponsiveness associated with neglected muscles. I was not aware how understaffed we were going to be in contrast to the ever-streaming orders of cake and tea. It didn’t help that I was forced to wear a white bandanna over my head in conjunction with a salmon colored apron.

“It would’ve been obvious if you could read the flyers posted all over the hallways,” Sekai laughed from her own bowl at my side. Her outfit shared a similar color scheme with my own, though more frilly and feminine. All the girls working the cafe dressed alike, snagging the gaze of the bulk of our patrons no doubt and reeling in the attention. Standing so close to Sekai and forcing my eyes on my work, I had difficulty blaming them.

“I wish the other cafes were putting up a better fight. It’s ridiculous how many people are crammed in here.”

“Well zombies and little sisters can only attract so many people.”

“I don’t know what they were thinking when they came up with those themes,” I said. “A cafe run by girls dressed as ‘little sisters’. Perhaps by far the strangest thing I witnessed yet.”

“Oh, you sure?” Sekai nudged. “I could always play little sister for you if that’s what you’re into. I don’t judge.”

I shuddered. “Well now cake is forever ruined for me thanks to you.”

She burst out laughing louder than I anticipated, but I laughed along anyways. It was a nice work environment, it just needed a few more hands.

“Where’s Makoto gone anyway?” I said after a quick look-about. “He disappeared just as this tidal wave decided to swamp us.”

“Maybe his shift ended,” Sekai shrugged. “I’d be out of here in a heartbeat once I’ve done my time.”

I peered at her. 

“You’d leave me here to die under the sheer volume of all this stick cake batter?”

“Hmm,” she crooned. “Maybe I’ll just sneak you out of here with me.”

She leaned in close.

“We could run out of here arm in arm, find a dark corner of the school and-”

“Oi, Hudson,” rang the less-than-dulcet tone of Hikari Kuroda. “Stop cuddling with your girlfriend and help me and Nanami carry out these pots of tea.”

“Coming!” I said, eager to oblige as Sekai giggled after my retreating form.

An hour or so later and the cafe was still raking in the numbers, but to a much lesser extent, and some of the other students in our class were finally showing up to pull the weight they’d left behind. At some point I found myself hurried out the front door by Kuroda. She assured me that my shift was over and that it was her turn to hang out with Sekai.

“You can have her back when we close up,” she said her tongue sticking out.

I made a face at her in return, an expression I felt looked somewhere between a snarl and a sneeze. It was a few steps down the crowded hall before I realized I had no idea what to do with myself. Seeing anything through the shunting sea of students and family proved a near impossible task, so I submitted to finding a direction and sticking to it. 

When I came to a clear I had high hopes that perhaps I could now feel my way to the exit and get something to eat. It was a little disorienting seeing the school so late in the day and flooded with people dressed in casual clothing. My high hopes crumbled away when I spied the meek figure of Kotonoha, sitting at a table for her class event, being talked down to by a couple students.

Of course I would come upon another scene like this. Was she really such an appealing target for these people? It was no wonder she recoiled from the world around her, which only magnified her problems. I strode towards the group, my confidence seeping away into each step.

Kotonoha sat slumped over, in all her humble, downcast glory while a group of girls heckled her like vultures. Nothing got my blood pumping quite like harassment towards the undeserving.

“Hey, let’s take it easy alright?” I said steadily as I approached the group with my hands up. They each spun around and stared at me in unison. The combined force of their movements almost struck my gait to a standstill, like a child who’s forgotten his lines in the face of the class play’s audience. Each girl wore a face of mixed emotions, minus Kotonoha who just looked droopy and defeated. They must have figured me for a teacher at first, because as soon as they gave me a brief look over, their faces switched over to anger and annoyance. 

“Gross,” said the assault leader under her breath. “It’s that foreign kid. What do you want? Can’t you see we’re having a conversation?”

My chin dove into my neck as I recoiled from the hostile teen, her biting words spat out like the hiss of a lioness. My heart had not been ready for such concentrated disgust, it took me a moment to swallow. I had been under the impression that those of the student body that knew of me found my presence only a curiosity or at the very least forgettable. It sure does give me a warm, fuzzy feeling to know that good old-fashioned xenophobia thrives here as strongly as anywhere else. I could feel the red seeping into my face as I addressed the two bullies.

“Leave Kotonoha alone,” I said with an attempted grit in my voice, though the words may have come out as more of a whimper. “I’m not afraid to turn nark on you jerks. Bullying is eye-rolling enough, but in a gang? Is this an 80s flick?”

A sprig of fear fell upon the pack of hyenas after their comprehension made its way through my stranger words. They exchanged looks before glancing at the curtained wall to their rear. I could see from the gap under the curtain that a room had been hidden from view. My skin began to crawl as a memory clawed at its rotting coffin, buried in the pile of mucky thoughts my brain refused to acknowledge the existence of. Without another word, they grimaced their white teeth in my direction and slithered away down the hall, weaving into the crowds and fading from sight. The discovery of whatever lay behind that curtain was apparently enough of a threat to save me the trouble of further involvement. I really didn’t feel like seeking out and ratting to a teacher. I took in a refreshing breath and looked over to Kotonoha.

“With all the practice you’re giving me I should take up a job as a white knight,” I chuckled. “You guys have renaissance fairs around here? Maybe I’ll just train as a bodyguard. Low profiles only.”

“I’m sorry,” she breathed from her blushing face, her hands fumbling atop the table. I swept at a lock of hair tickling my brow.

“Come on, you know you don’t have to apologize to me. I’ve always got your back,” I said, walking up to the short clothed table. A few swamp-colored flyers coated its surface, all embroidered with cartoony monsters and ghostly faces. The text glowed in an eerie green Japanese font, but the message seemed clear enough; a thrilling haunted house and surefire invasion of your personal space by some stranger in a smelly rubber mask. It didn’t seem very successful, what with the lack of a line or even any nearby solicitors. Everyone else gathered and crowded further down the hall.

“What’s with those girls?” I asked after refocusing my priorities and leaning on the table. “What bone do they have to pick with you?”

“It’s nothing,” she said quietly. “I’m supposed to be relieved by another girl, but she hasn’t shown up.”

“Welp, that’s her problem. She’ll get chewed out. Let’s go get something to eat that isn’t cake. So sick of it.”

“I can’t…”

It took a good few minutes of prodding and blame-removal assurance to get Kotonoha to finally desert her post. If anything I’d vouch for her if the situation called for it. My word had to be worth something around here, right? Otome could join us if we ran into her... No that wouldn’t do. There’s a schism of a sort between her and Kotonoha. Whatever. We'll cross that bridge when we come to it. I needed to get away from that area hidden behind those curtains. 

“All that smoke and smell coming from outside reminds of the fairs back home. I hope there’s cotton candy.”

“You’re a very considerate person, Rupert.”

I raised a brow at the little glimpse of glee she held on her averted face. It would be a lie to say my heart didn’t feel a twinge of delight at her words. The day I become unaffected by compliments like these is the day my soul has officially withered away into worthlessness. 

“And you’re too sweet for this world. How’s the latest issue of that ‘Hatsukoi’ series you’re reading? That new love rival making a mess of things yet?”

With a little coaxing I managed to pull Kotonoha enough out of her shell and back to her usual cheery and surprisingly talkative self. If there was one topic that got her jaw jabbering it was that sappy series of romance novels. It was a rare sight to see her without one in her arms.

How we ever made out each other’s words was beyond me. The moment we stepped through the school doors into the evening air our eardrums were assaulted by the yelling and raucous laughter of the crowds bunching up around the food stalls and their equally noisy vendors. Every time I had to ask Kotonoha to repeat herself for the third time she laughed and shook her head dismissively. We eventually stumbled into a somewhat quieter clearing that allowed for less vocally strained conversation, which would have surely started up if not for a new hiccup that strutted into our midst.

“Hudson?”

I turned to find the shocked face of Otome Katou. The girl’s pupils darted between myself and Kotonoha, her expression leveling off somewhere between a subdued anger and sadness.

“Katou,” I gasped. “I’ve been looking all over for you.”

“What are you doing with..?” 

I noticed Kotonoha sneaking her way into the protection of my shadow the moment Otome appeared. My patience wavered on the edge, held together by tape and chewing gum. Everyone was either going to get along or every artery in my body would rupture, but not before I finally explode in a torrent of screaming frustration and voice my distaste for this world with my dying breath.

“She’s a friend, Katou. Come on, let’s lighten up for the festival already. Let bygones be bygones etcetera, etcetera.”

Her face remained stuck in a frown.

“Y-you were supposed to spend the festival with me…”

I won’t lie, I knew I’d wronged her. Shame weighed heavily in my heart like a brick of ice. A promise was a promise, but it wasn’t like the festival was moments away from ending forever. We still had hours left until closing, and there was still tomorrow’s events.

“We can still do that, but I would love it if you joined us. I’m sure Kotonoha wouldn’t mind quite as much as you.”

It was a tense moment, waiting for her answer while she stared into my shoes. Both girls were almost perfect mirrors in their suppressed demeanors while all around us students and families alike raced around, talking loudly, eating greasy food while we sat here locked in a tense, gray atmosphere. I could feel the slight tension of Kotonoha’s small grip on the back of my blazer.

Finally, Otome nodded. I sighed. Kotonoha made no visible response.

At first I was forced to play the leader of our small party, which was no good. I had no idea what the directional signs hanging everywhere said. Otome finally realized we were going nowhere and decided to take control. She lead the three of us to see a performance put on by the school’s performing arts club. This left me with enough free brain space to manage the unenviable task of sparking conversation. It proved to be as awkward to start up as I'd imagined. It wasn’t until my lungs ached from laughing after the play’s sub-par acting that the tension began to lighten up.

“I dunno,” I said after a last wheezy chuckle. “I mean, I know they’re doing their best but man, the over-the-top acting struck my deepest funny bone.”

“Geez,” Otome said. “That’s the way plays are. They have to exaggerate so that everyone in the theater can clearly understand the emotions being expressed.”

“You’re right. I’m being a bit harsh.” I just needed to air out a bit of anxiety before I blew a gasket. Laughter fixes everything. “It just wasn’t my type of story. Maybe I’ve had Romeo and Juliet shoved down my throat a few too many times over the years.”

“I thought the modern quirks made it very romantic,” Kotonoha said through a quiet blush.

Otome actually nodded. “Yeah! See? At least someone sees the hardwork they put into it.”

The sun had ducked out some time ago by this point. The crowds had thinned to a scattering of friendly groups while the first night of the festival drew to its close. Our small group had taken to strolling the school’s corridors. I caught a few snippets here and there of giddy students shooting whispers of the dance taking place on the eve of tomorrow. A very traditional and elegant event, one where couples take each other by the hand and skip about a large, blazing bonfire while the moon watched on with envy. It would be a romantic night dripping with high hopes, fluttering hearts, and gratuitous amounts of superstition. Suddenly my stomach was not agreeing with the vendor food. 

I heard the dying click clack of soft footsteps retreating from somewhere around a corner as we came upon it, as if somebody had been spooked by our approach. Only I seemed to notice, and when we made I found only an empty hall. I looked back at Otome and Kotonoha. 

I had drifted out of their stiff and begrudging conversation, something about Kotonoha needing to speak up more, and while they refused to even glance in each other’s direction, Otome’s words were not harsh and Kotonoha even nodded acknowledgment. They were actually sort of getting along. The idea of a friendship between a snake and a mongoose popped into my head.

“What’s with that dopey look,” Otome squinted.

“Just thought of something funny I dreamed once,” I made up on the spot. Not the best Idea. Now I was thinking about those nightmares again. 

“Oh my,” Kotonoha said when we finally reached her post. It lay completely deserted.

I looked at her funny. “It’s no biggie. We’ll back you up if you’re blamed for your classmate’s laziness.”

“I-it’s not that,” she sputtered. “I just remembered I left the keys to the storage closet in my locker.

“That’s fine,” said Otome with a spring in her spine. “We’ll make sure the booth doesn’t go anywhere until you get back.”

Kotonoha made the smallest bow before hopping into a sprint back down the hall we’d come from. I looked at Otome’s brighter-than-the-sun grin. My trust in its sincerity began to wan.

“Do you really need…” I trailed off when I realized Kotonoha was long gone. That girl could give Forrest Gump a run for his money. Heh.

“I swear you come up with the strangest expressions at the strangest times,” Otome said.

“Sorry. Sometimes I can’t help the clever thoughts that come to my mind.”

“Careful, you could break your neck with a swelled head like that.”

I rubbed the back of my neck in good humor.

“Y’know, I think I should go with her…”

“Wait.” 

Otome’s face had shifted a shade darker, her expression twisting slightly in a strange array of emotions, like she was fighting to get something out.

“Do you know what that is?” her eyes led me to the curtained room over by Kotonoha’s post. Oh no.

“The crochet club?”

She pouted.

“C’mere, let me show you.”

“No tha-”

Her hand had lashed out to snatch mine from the air, landing with the slightest sting, and through the curtain we went since apparently everybody in this world has the strength of an ox once they have me by the arm. 

My pulse pounded in my very red ears. Despite the cool halls outside, the air in this little room felt heavy and humid, and carried the scent of sweat, similar to a locker room, but mixed with something I could not quite put my finger on, a musk that set my teeth on edge. I tried to avert my eyes from everything, but that proved impossible. Morbid curiosity held the reins now. Between my fingers I could see a bed, a coat rack, and… a box of tissues. In the corner was a small bin filled to the brim with said tissues, riddled with unspeakables. Nausea overcame me. Was this what it felt like seeing a dead body for the first time?

“This rest area is one of Sakakino’s festival traditions.” Otome said in a subdued voice.

“Otome, this is starting to weird me out.”

The petite girl bent over and held her clenched hand forward. I could see something poking out from inside her fist, something plastic, like the wrapper of a hard candy. Then I spotted a very similar wrapper at our feet, torn open and discarded without a second thought. Then I noticed another. And another. If I didn’t know any better, I’d think I missed the free candy someone was clearly passing out.

“Hold out your hand,” she said with slight irritation.

“That’s okay. I’ve had enough sweets for today.”

She grabbed my palm and crumpled the wrapper against it, her face having grown inches away from mine. Her warm breath was heavy, washing over my skin with the slightest hint of bubblegum. Her eyes shimmered and threatened to flood the room. 

“I… want to be more than friends with you.”

I swallowed the rocky bulge in my throat and looked down at the unopened, scandalous item in my quivering hand. The plastic gleamed with the subtle outline of the rubber tool within. Somewhere deep inside I may have actually believed if I wished hard enough it would have turned out to be candy after all. I’m only ever right when it’s inconvenient.

I shook my head and I backed away, which was a big mistake on my part because it resulted in the back of my leg colliding with the bed and sending my unsuspecting rump down onto the mattress with as much grace as a dizzy toddler.

“Do you not like me?”

“Katou, you know I think you’re a very nice girl, but-”

Her face dove in fast but slowed suddenly inches from my own. She hovered there as we locked pupils for a short, intimate moment before she melded into me with perfect precision. My brain froze and what little coherence I had been capable of prior flew out my ear and into the bin full of sin. It smelled as though someone had smacked me with a bouquet of warm roses, and my vision was once again obstructed by the eclipse of a girl’s much-too-close face. Everything within me felt sick with conflict. This was wrong, more wrong than anything I’ve ever been apart of, but my body’s hormones could not be bothered to care. The violence of Otome’s passionate movements scattered my glasses around every corner of my face as they held on for dear life. 

“Oto- Otom- St- stop!” I strangled. Strange enough, I thought to myself that it was like trying to get a tenacious dog to keep away from my peanut-butter coated face. Except in this instance I felt a lot more guilt over the fact that I kind of enjoyed it.

Something beyond the blur that was Otome’s face caught my eye. Another eye. Two, in fact, ruby red, burning with anger. My heart dropped out from the bottom of my rib cage at the sight of little Setsuna, her teeth clenched in a grimace. The second our gazes locked she was gone, the curtain billowing after her. It happened so fast I briefly wondered if I’d imagined it.

With my hands on her shoulders I managed to wrench Otome back far enough for us to see eye to eye. Her eyelids fell half-closed and her cheeks resembled peaches, giving her a dazed look. I could still hear the footsteps of the spying Setsuna in the distance. My chest suddenly felt like a stake had been driven through it. 

“O-Otome, I’m sorry,” I said, still keeping her at arm’s length as I rounded around toward the exit. I tripped over her feet and stumbled on my own. “We will discuss this properly later. I just- You’re a nice girl and I value you- no I can’t explain now. Please, forgive me.”

I slapped the curtains away and took off in the direction of Setsuna’s footsteps. They were faint, but just loud enough over the dull hum of the activities outside for me to follow. If I had my bearings down, she was running in the direction of our class’s cafe. My skin prickled with a cold sweat.

I cried after her, but my efforts were vain. Reason was the last thing I imagine she would expect to spill out of my mouth any time soon. In fact I think my yelling has only sped her up. 

A couple corner turns later and I managed to catch a glimpse of her feet fading into a doorway. I pumped everything I had into my legs, leaping down the hall like a panicking gazelle. I threw the door open and stepped inside, inwardly bracing for the yell of a frustrated teen.

All I found was an empty cafe. No more customers for the day. Everyone had packed up to stomp off home or hang around outside as the last embers of the festival petered off until tomorrow. It took me a moment to see Kiyoura’s trademark bow hovering about the doorway to the kitchen in the back. She made no sound as she peeked in through the doorway, apparently spying just as she had moments ago.

Strange. I fully expected to find her and Sekai waiting, Kiyoura glaring and Sekai crestfallen but reserving judgment. I tip-toed up behind. Before I could reach the short girl, she backed up until her head bumped into the wall behind her, seemingly unaware of my presence. Her pupils remained frozen, stretched wide in apparent shock. I made to reach out to her but something caught me by the ear. At first it had seemed perfectly quiet, then the blood pounding in my ears finally died down, and I heard sounds that sent every hair on my body rigid. 

The shuffle of feet, the clunking and banging of scattered kitchenware, muffled cries of protest. Someone was making a mess. 

“No!” screamed a distinct voice. “Get off!”

I punched the door open, leaving my knuckle sore but irrelevant. Flour and metal bowls and utensils lay over every tile. Backed into a corner of the kitchen, Sekai fought as a male student forced himself upon her. It was Makoto.

Something flared inside my chest, perspiring through every capillary, blossoming out through my vibrating muscles. The fibers of my limbs strained, clenching and shaking, my nails digging trenches into my palms. My face curled and wrinkled into something resembling the rippling bark of an oak. Everything faded into an alarming shade of scarlet, like blood had splattered into my eyes, overshadowing in my peripheral. The kitchen and its mess pulled away into the ether, leaving only the sight of the struggling pair before me. The blood pounding in my ears returned with an intensity that multiplied gradually ad infinitum, deafening me to the rest of the world, pushing my hammering heart to its limit. It was suddenly very difficult to catch my breath.

I wanted to call his name, get him to turn around and face me like a proper gentleman, but my larynx refused, the last dregs of my humanity had long dripped off the back of my amygdalae. 

I moved at them, at least I think it was me. Everything felt like a dream, like there was a delay in my inputs, everything was sluggish. There was a scream, maybe more than one, I wasn’t sure, I found myself rolling around on the ground, locked with Makoto. I threw fists and he retaliated with kicks. Neither of us were well versed in combat, our attacks were clumsy and unfocused, sometimes missing completely, sometimes hitting the ground or a nearby cabinet. 

With every quaking impact I could feel my nerves trying to alert my brain in the background to how painful it was, but my pain receptors had been coated in an insulating foam of adrenaline. 

At some point a force began pulling me back away from the fray. I began to resist until I noticed the delicate hands on my arm. Sekai held on to me while Kiyoura did the same with Makoto by the kitchen entrance. His clothing was torn in multiple places, his lip was bleeding, and he was panting heavily, but it was all superficial. I felt about the same, some slight swelling on my face, ears ringing, and my right ankle refused any weight I tried to place on it.

“If I ever,” I began, but I interrupted myself with more breathing. More threats were not in the cards as far as my lungs were concerned. Why have I still not taken the chance to exercise?

“Get out of here,” I croaked.

He didn’t. For the longest time it looked like he was as done with this as I was, but something in his eyes returned, a small ember reignited and his face fell into darkness once more. He broke from Kiyoura’s frail grasp and swiped something from the nearby counter, something with a menacing glint. I held Sekai behind me and backed up with her. Both girls yelled at Makoto to calm down, but his gait would not falter. Clenched in his bruised hand was perhaps the largest cleaver I’ve ever seen. Why we ever needed a knife so big for our little cafe was beyond me. I could see my battered, panicked face staring back at me in its intimidating reflection. 

Then he froze, a bewildered look clouding over his bruised face. A tiny, strangled sound squeaked from his mouth and the knife clattered to the floor. I watched him bring a hand to his side, and that was when I noticed the dark spot swelling along the folds of his coat like an uncontrollable forest fire. His hand was soon covered in a very deep but bright red liquid. Within seconds his strength failed and he crumpled to the floor, leaving me to stare into the malevolent eyes of my savior.

Kotonoha looked up from the shuddering form of her bloodied boyfriend, her face glowing with the sincerest smile. She held the knife between her hands like it was a precious child. Every gory image of her from every piece of ‘School Days’ media I’d ever observed compiled into my head. I looked down at Makoto’s wide eyes. They were fading. I fell to my knees with a thud.

“Kotonoha,” I said in disbelief. “Why?”

Her head tilted as if I had said the darnedest thing in the world.

“I’m just protecting my white knight.”

More screaming. 

My tunneled vision focused one last time on the haunting, empty eyes of Kotonoha before narrowing into complete blackness.


End file.
